Nanna Ivarsson: Smooth Acorn (5615) Tobacco Pipe

The last time we saw a Nanna Ivarsson Acorn, which was back in last September, it was quite a different creature than this one, or its sibling appearing in this same update. Actually creature would better fit the latest two, rather than that previous Acorn; where the other was a more formal, symmetrical take, both of the latest show signs of design cross-over from Nanna's Fish — also represented in this same batch.

Though not as overtly organic as the Fish, this Nanna Ivarsson interpretation of the Acorn does clearly play much with a sense of motion communicated both in the curl of the profile and through asymmetry, the latter method at its strongest at the shank-face, most subtle by the time you reach the bowl. Aside from the obvious intent of breathing more life into an Acorn design, I find this whole design interesting on account of the way it follows a theme of taper. Just as the modified tear-drop shank progresses from a wide display of plateau to a slimmer, smooth and clean form by the time it reaches into the transition, the shape as whole tapers in its asymmetry from one end to the other. At the shank-end it is strongest; at the rim is just a subtle hint, expressed by the lingering note of a single, subtle ridge.

- Eric N. Squires