Andrey Grigoriev: Smooth Tomato Tobacco Pipe

Andrey Grigoriev's shaping style reflects a broad aesthetic range, with the Russian carver's creatively rendering organic designs as impressive as his more reserved interpretations. This Tomato is one of Andrey's more conservative shapes, prioritizing simple curves and beautiful lines, highlighted in a smooth finish and free of accenting materials to ensure focus is paid on the grain and line work. That said, this pipe is not without its subtle nuances — most readily apparent in how Grigoriev has juxtaposed the bowl against the shank. The bowl is squat and broad in typical Tomato fashion, offering a plump in-hand feel that delights the palm and begs to be cradled. The shank, however, bears a rectangular cross section, contrasting the bowl's rounded curvature with a more structural sense of crisp facets and firm ridgelines. The stem base continues that architectural motif in saddle configuration, and the rest of the mouthpiece exhibits a slight taper toward the hand-crafted button and funneled slot. In profile, the composition displays a subtle S-curve for graceful momentum, and in hand, this is a compact pipe for comfortable clenching, with no shortage of flame grain and birdseye to lose oneself in.