Sakura Koi Brush Pens

Sakura (Fun Fact: means 'cherry blossom' in Chinese, hence the logo) are one of the biggest producers and manufacturers of high quality artist pens like Pigma Micron and of course Gelly Roll (Fun Fact #2: Sakura were the first company in the world to create gel ink pens!). It's no surprise then that their range of colouring brush pens, Koi, are hugely respected and used by many artists, illustrators, cartoonists etc.

The Japanese foam nib is extremely durable to heavy use and springs back to its original shape after every stroke, no matter how much pressure you use. You can create line widths from under 1mm to 5+mm, just by changing the angle and pressure you use.

The colour range is great too- 48 in total, though I am reviewing a small 12 colour pack. Fear not though, even if you only have a few of the pens like me you can still make loads of amazing blends using the 'touch tip' marker technique I talked about on my Tombow Dual Brush Pens tutorial. Here are the colours you can choose from in the 12 pack. Simply take two pens of any colour (two shades of the same colour or similar colours work better)...

Hold the tip of the darker pen above the tip of the lighter pen and touch together...

The longer you hold them together for, the longer your blend will be- check out some quick two-pen blends I created just with a few out of the 12 set!

Cool, right? And don't worry about ruining or staining the tip of your pen- the nib will go straight back to its original ink colour as you 'scribble out' the other one. So you can create gradated leaves with the two greens, outer space effects with a purple and blue, and loads more! The waterbased ink doesn't soak through pages, although if you're using a double sided colouring book I'd test that they don't show through on the other side before colouring a page.

Here is a quick picture I coloured with the Sakura Koi. I think I need to work on my blends a bit but I'm excited to keep practicing :)

You can find Sakura Koi Colour Brush pens individually at Cult Pens, or in packs on Amazon.