Adam Davidson: Partially Sandblasted Amoeba with Bamboo Tobacco Pipe

A shape Adam's been playing with for over a decade, the Amoeba first came into existence as the result of a challenge. The same can be said of many achievements, and this one is especially familiar to a pipemaker: deriving a shape from a particularly challenging block of briar. The block in question was acutely shallow, the distance from center to plateau only allowing for a decidedly compressed form. So, Adam did just that, allowing the grain to serve as a guide for his experimentation. At the rim, he followed the plateau's natural undulation, resulting in wavy aesthetic up top that's simultaneously organic and artful. Here, he defined the juxtaposition of gradual flare and pronounced waviness with a combination of dark sandblast and vibrant contrast, serving to coax both a splendidly stimulating texture and a warm palette of plateau-kissed birdseye, with nary a line out of place. Going one further, Adam lent it a shank of fashioned from his special stock of dark bamboo (the likes of which I am quite fond), the practically arrow-straight presentation of natural nodes operating in perfect rhythm with the composition at large. Like his famous Fig shape, no two of these are alike, so when this Amoeba finds a host, there's no telling when we'll see on again. Highly recommended.