Herriot Pipes Contrast Sandblasted Bent Billiard w/ Horn Handmade Briar Pipe, New

Description

In 2003, one of France’s preeminent pipe luminaries, Erwin Van Hove, jubilantly proclaimed, “Hallelujah! One of the very best American artisans has recently settled on French soil.” Two decades later, Antoine Grenard, director of Chapuis-Comoy and president of the Confrérie des Maîtres-Pipiers de Saint-Claude, oversaw the induction of another artisan originally from the Anglophone world into its hallowed brotherhood. Van Hove was, of course, welcoming Trever Talbert. The Confrérie, on the other hand, was welcoming Chris Herriot. Parallels between the two are difficult to ignore; both were outsiders who laid down roots in France and, crucially, thrived by it. Both forged connections with the Francophone pipe community, developing friendships and associations that would help them lay the foundations of their respective brands. And both would build something on these foundations that garnered them significant national and international acclaim.

In Herriot’s case, this meant apprenticing under Bruno Nuttens (himself a former student of Pierre Morel and Tom Eltang), spending several days each week laboring in Nuttens’ Charpey workshop, and the rest of his time in his own. Like Nuttens, Herriot knows the worth of good briar, some of which he uses for his Fledgling series (crafted from seasoned, pre-turned stummels from the Saint-Claude campuses) and some that he uses for his Hand Made pipes (crafted from choice blocks of plateaux briar).

Looking through Chris Herriot’s portfolio, one finds a variety of designs, including a number of renditions of modern “Danish” staples. But considered overall, one can’t help but notice a great fondness for the classics, which Herriot re-interprets in his own, quite contemporary, ways. Pipes like this bent billiard are a great example. In essence it’s not dissimilar from, say, the Dunhill mid-century shape 53 (especially given how wonderfully lightweight it is), but the use of a brick red contrast sandblast, along with a cumberland stem that has a band of horn inlaid, make it decidedly different from the norms of Anglo-French pipe making. The craggy relief of the briar’s exposed ring grain is also far more neoclassical, with consistency and symmetry balanced with the more rugged, aleatory nature of—well, nature.

 

Details:

Length: 5.3″ / 134.6mm

Bowl Width: 0.71 / 18.03mm

Bowl Depth: 1.34″ / 34.03mm

Weight: 1.2oz / 36g