Italian Estates: Ser Jacopo Smooth Bent Billiard (L1) (Maxima Maxima) Tobacco Pipe

Founded in 1982 by Giancarlo Guidi, Ser Jacopo has built a reputation on crafting high-quality briars that are renowned for their robust proportions and playful shaping cues. The Italian atelier's style has since defined the Pesaro style of pipe making, each of their pipes imbued with a sense of character and reflecting the whimsical creativity that went into crafting them. Though Guidi passed away in 2012, his legacy lives on not only in the pipes he crafted, or the company he founded, but in the language of design that he helped to pioneer. A rather conservative offering from the Ser Jacopo workshop, this bent Billiard's shaping and sense of line remind me very much of the Danish style, though with an undoubtedly Italian Neoclassical sense of proportion. With its two "Maxima" stamps, it's no wonder that this piece is a bit larger than others, especially when one looks at the shank in concert with the bowl. Their similar sense of proportion makes the overall shape quite lengthy, the shank's upward curve positioning the deeply bent saddle stem for comfortable smoking. Supple and robust in hand, the bowl is Egg-like in silhouette, with a mid-set waist and easy taper to the rim. Dressed in a smooth, mahogany-hued finish, the stummel here showcases a wealth of handsome grain, with flame surrounding the bowl and flowing through the shank.