Smooth Acorn with Boxwood (Diamond) Tobacco Pipe

The wide world of pipemakers does not lack for some unusual career switches, but Peter Heding's molecular-biologist-to-pipemaker career path is, quite easily, one of the most notably unusual. The pipe collector community is unquestionably lucky to have him, however, as the work ethic and dedication it took to earn his Ph.D. is quite conspicuously at play in the design, execution, and finish of his briars, and never more so than in the case of his premier "Diamond" grade pieces. We certainly see it here, in this plump, voluptuous, yet perfectly balanced Acorn, an immense canvas for wild flame grain, which just also happens to all but melt into hand. Not content to merely created a briar which is beautiful on the surface, Peter even took an unusual approach to the broad boxwood accent, which is affixed not to the shank-end, but to the base of the stem; when the stem is removed, we find underneath a perfectly polished and finished display smokey end-grain scattered with freckles of birdseye.

- Eric N. Squires