Ryan Alden: Natural Sandblasted Bent Dublin with Horn (Jack of Diamonds) Tobacco Pipe

While Ryan Alden tends to craft pipes that emulate the shape-chart standards of the old Anglo-French marques, this bent Dublin by the Texas-based carver appears Danish in execution, possessing a dynamic, active outline and a pronounced organic flourish. Up front, a stocky bowl stands atop an angled heel, with the chamber's walls rising from this steep gradient and displaying a dramatic forward cant as they expand to a broad, plateau-flecked rim. A wide transition follows the bowl and marks the start of an upturned shank framed by six crisp facets. These panels and their intersecting ridgelines lend a structural quality to the shape and undergird the aforementioned heel. A trim saddle stem tops off the composition, its wide shoulders accented with a gorgeous band of horn whose creamy hues contrast the mouthpiece's dark complexion. A striking sandblast completes the ensemble and draws out radiating growth rings across the bowl's flanks.