Bill Shalosky: Partially Sandblasted Bent Dublin with Mammoth (437) Tobacco Pipe

My personal favorite out of today's batch of Shalosky pipes, this chubby bent Dublin checks off all the boxes from impressive grain and a striking color palette to superb shaping and expert engineering. It's one of those pieces that seems to take on two forms when viewed from different vantage points: In profile, it's a compact, stout, and rather squat Dublin iteration, the rim gently inflated to echo the domed saddle stem and consistently arching heel. From above, though, the shape takes on a much more dynamic disposition — the flanks of the bowl slightly pinched to lend the rim a forward-pointing, oval orientation.

It's the rim, then, that also draws much of the focus. Not only is it stained in a vivid, honey-blonde contrast and dotted with birdseye to stand out against the red clay-hued sandblast of the stummel below, but Bill has also slightly altered conventional shaping cues. Often, one will find a rim concave and, if dotted with partial plateau, the craggy texture will be oriented along the outer-most portion of rim, leaving the inner section smooth and sometimes crisply chamfered. Here, though, Shalosky has done the complete opposite. Instead of concave, the rim slopes downward at the sides when viewed from the smoker's perspective, lending the defining ridgeline a slightly parabolic curve. Regarding plateau, he's positioned it just atop the chamber opening, resembling rising ribbons of tobacco and accenting the profile with subtle asymmetry. Delightfully creative work from the American carver, and for the cherry on top, it's adorned with a ring of creamy mammoth at the shank end.