Former: Smooth Bent Dublin with Bamboo and Boxwood Tobacco Pipe

An impossibly beautiful length of pale bamboo characterizes the organic personality of this lengthy Dublin from Hans "Former" Nielsen. It's... well, it's amazing, really, impossibly textured with 11(!) knuckles curving up from the low and abbreviated shank to the crisply defined saddle mouthpiece.

The bowl is colored in a traditional mahogany contrast stain and ably illuminates the impressive vertical grain rising up the flanks from the heel, which extends below the tobacco chamber for a knob-like protuberance that is well rounded and fitting for this bowl. The rim is wide and plateau laden, its knobby texture contrasting nicely against the smooth flawlessness of the stummel. At more than seven inches in length, there's a lot of pipe here, and it's fitted with more than enough enticing visual elements to maintain one's interest well into the future.