HS Studio Sandblasted Long Shank Blowfish w/ Boxwood Estate Briar Pipe, Unsmoked

Description

If you’ve been keeping up with the world of Chinese pipe making, their artisan scene has been really taking off over the last decade. Like the great Danish institutions of old, many of these pipes are produced in artisan workshops such as Zhiputang, Qi Studio, and GH Zhang. Hong Kong’s HS Studio follows a similar model, with a team of expert in-house carvers crafting high-quality briars in a variety of styles.

The blowfish is a staple of contemporary artisan pipe making, and has been for several decades now. Lars Ivarsson is credited with its invention, and though one may point to certain pipes made by his father and teacher, Sixten Ivarsson, as its earliest conception, it is true that Sixten’s blowfishes look positively germinal compared to those which Lars loosed upon the pipe world. This one is certainly closer to Lars’ blowfishes than other, notable renditions (such as those of Peter Heeschen or Tom Eltang), in no small part thanks to its long, graceful shank, though I wouldn’t call it a 1-1 copy by any measure. Every pipe maker has their own way of making a shape, after all, with this one leaning into the boxier, slightly weaving aesthetics of recent “speciations.” This one is fitted with a boxwood inlay in its ebonite stem and features excellent, ring grain sandblasting, made all the more impressive by the fact that blowfishes like this one don’t tend to have especially curved surfaces that one would ordinarily orient growth rings around.

This pipe is completely unsmoked, with an original bowl coating.

 

Details:

Length: 7.4″ / 187.9mm

Bowl Width: 0.77 / 19.55mm

Bowl Depth: 1.49″ / 37.84mm

Weight: 2.0oz / 58g