Bentley (Former’s Design) Smooth Bent Billiard (Estate)

If you’re familiar with high-grade pipes—especially those from Denmark—you’ll likely have at least heard of Hans ‘Former’ Nielsen. Former began his career, aged 15, repairing pipes for Poul Rasmussen at Suhr’s Pibemageri. Later, Former was referred to the W.O. Larsen workshop by Rasmussen, where – after an examination by Sven Knudsen, who had designed many early Larsen models—he was recruited as a fully-fledged pipe maker. Within his 10 years at Larsen, Former rose to the rank of workshop supervisor, having his own apprentices of the likes of Teddy Knudsen and Tonni Nielsen. In the years since, Former’s primary output has been in pipes under his own name, but there have been a few notable exceptions, such as the Bentley make. From the mid-1980s to some time in the 2000s, Former developed high-grade pipes that were manufactured, with various teams and at various locations, under the Bentley make.

While Bentley pipes were originally manufactured in Switzerland, with Former providing a supervisory role in their production, he and his wife, Daniela, ultimately returned to Denmark, where they would remain for the foreseeable future. But the production of Bentley pipes did not end here. Instead, Former continued to manufacture them “closer to home,” as it were, having relocated much of the machinery involved in making them during his return to Denmark. This particular pipe comes from those later years of Bentley’s Danish production. It is a quite stunning bent billiard rendition, extraordinary bird’s-eye graining, and a light finish that shows off said graining in its entirety. In other words, it is the kind of pipe that should be expected of a figure like Former, even when creating serially-produced smoking instruments.

The condition is good. Slight inner rim charring, chamber slightly over-reamed, and some very small scratches on the bowl.

Details:

Length: 6.3″ / 160.0mm

Bowl Width: 0.77 / 19.55mm

Bowl Depth: 1.76″ / 44.70mm

Weight: 2.0oz / 58g