Smooth Horn with Horn (Snail) Tobacco Pipe

I'm not sure who first pioneered this shank-less design, where the stem enters directly into the side a horn shaped bowl, but both Tom Eltang and Teddy Knudsen have played with the idea in the past few years. It's a fundamentally different construction idea from most pipes: it frees the pipe maker from having to integrate a shank into the composition, keeping the lines clean. Though it can be used to great affect to create ornate pieces where the focus is very much on the bowl, Tom has done something quite different with it here. The shape could not be more minimalist. Tom has literally stripped everything away from the tall, curving cone shape that defines the bowl. There is nothing ancillary, nothing distracting from that central aesthetic idea. All details, all superfluities are stripped from that underlying form, leaving a simple, clean, form, free of distractions. The long stem serves as an interesting complement to the bowl, counterbalancing the lines of the bowl, yet cohering with it. The lines of the horn decoration at the end of the stem (the stem and bowl separate at the bowl) echo those of the bowl. It's straight, of course, but that same conical shape is present, though without the curvature. The grain is quite impressive, with fine straight grain covering the sides of the bowl, terminating into birdseye on the bottom/front. A magnificent piece from a legendary pipe maker.

-- Sykes Wilford