P.W. Akkermanis a pen store in The Hague, Netherlands that was founded in 1910. To celebrate their 100th Anniversary in 2010, they released a line of inks with a very distinctive ink bottle.

While for the longest time I had presumed the name came from the intense blue colour of this ink, or from its red sheen, it turns out Akkerman No. 5 gets its name from the pop group of the same name. A bit of an international one-hit-wonder, Shocking Blue were best known for their single Venus.

Akkermans Shocking Blue is also a modern cult classic in fountain pen circles, with it regularly being touted as a suitable replacement for the long discontinued Parker Penman Sapphire.

Theink bottle fills by tipping the bottle upside down so that ink flows from the large bottom section, into a small upper section. When you tip the bottle back up, a small marble rests in the neck of the bottle to create a reservoir, making it easy to fill the fountain pen. The P.W. Akkerman bottles contain 60mL of inks, while the name of each colour has been named after a different location in the Hague.