Martelo: Smooth Cutty with Laca Tobacco Pipe

Gustavo Cunha, the Brazilian carver behind Martelo pipes, developed an interest in woodworking at a young age, crafting bows and arrows from scratch for his friends. It was an auspicious start to his pipe making journey, as both bows and pipes require a keen eye for shaping and balance as well as engineering designed for practical application. Cunha eventually attended university to study furniture design, a trade that provided him with tools and workspace needed to experiment with crafting pipes. A visit to Tom Eltang in Denmark further spurred Cunha's interest in pipe making, and before long the Brazilian artisan had turned an interest and hobby into a full-time career. His work showcases a special aptitude for stylized finishes and dramatic forms that take inspiration from the natural world.

This Cutty is something of an outlier within Cunha's portfolio, as the carver often favors organic forms and texturally stimulating finishes. This piece, however, is smoothly finished and classically composed. The Cutty shape hearkens back to the days of clay tavern pipes that predated the utilization of briar, and Cunha has recreated the shape with a tall, forward-canted bowl that tapers subtly from the rim to the softly pointed heel. The rim favors the fore of the bowl a bit more than the aft, further compounding the ebbing momentum of the piece, while the pencil-thin shank and stem trail out back. The stummel wears a fetching, smoky, dark chestnut smooth finish that showcases some dense fields of birdseye on either flank of the bowl. A colorful lacquer accent, "laca" in Portuguese, adorns the shank. The specific lacquer that Gustavo used here is inspired by the layers of lacquer that would build up on the tables of a furniture workshop he once worked at. Similar to Fordite, these layers of lacquer present a complex and immersive pattern of color and hue when sanded down, and Gustavo has here accented the shank with this material, adding modernist flash and also paying homage to his experience as a furniture maker. Lightweight, stylish, and charming, this piece is an exquisite bit of craftsmanship.