Dasha Florov: Smooth Sleeping Fish Tobacco Pipe

Dasha Florov's shaping style is influenced greatly by the Danish tradition of pipe design, and the younger carver draws inspiration particularly from Nanna Ivarsson. This Sleeping Fish design is an homage to the Danish master, being a rendition of one of Nanna's shapes. The Fish is an iconic form of Nanna's father, Lars, and is defined by a rounded, Egg-like bowl accompanied by a curling teardrop shank. In Nanna's Sleeping Fish rendition, though, she curls said shank all the way back, connecting it to the bowl's aft for a striking, transition-less shape.

This is the second time we've encountered Dasha's rendition of the design, the first having been a touch more reserved and compact. By contrast, this one boasts a more flourishing, dynamic style. The top of the curled shank comes to a dramatic point above the bowl's rim, while the bowl itself urges forward from the shape's "tail." Uniting these two elements, the shank face tapers downward into a panel along the underside, eventually becoming a crisp ridgeline that travels all the way through the bowl's fore to the rim. Especially of note is how Dasha has allowed the briar's grain to inform the piece's shape — plateau marks the top of the shank, echoed by a tiny section at the rim, while vertical grain adorns the flanks, aligning well with the bowl's canted posture and the shank's sweeping form.