English Estates: Barling's Make Ye Olde Wood Fossil Canadian (1488) (T.V.F.) (Pre-Transition) Tobacco Pipe

Benjamin Barling was an English silversmith known for his intricately detailed work in ornamenting meerschaum pipes. Realizing the potential of this venture, he founded B. Barling and Sons in 1812, outfitting pipe smokers with fine fitments for nearly a century until, in 1906, the family began production on their own line of briar pipes. These pipes quickly gained a reputation for not only their style, but for offering superior smoking qualities and high-end craftsmanship. The Canadian is a rather rare shape from the brand, and the "1488" in particular is a designation we've never seen before, making this pipe quite the collector's item, especially as it was crafted during Barling's Pre-Transition era. The pipe's transition is wide and gives way to an extremely compressed stretch of ovoid shank met by a short, tapering stem of black vulcanite in a nice display of the profile's archetypal standards. The bowl is tall and stands on a rounded heel, its walls pushing out a touch at the fore for a subtle curvature in hand. Dressed in the crisp sandblast and earthy stain of the Ye Olde Wood Fossil finish, there's plenty of handsome grain to appreciate here.