Big Ben Vintage 515 Smooth Dublin Estate Briar Pipe, Unsmoked

Description

Big Ben is a Dutch pipe brand presently owned by Gubbels, the same company that currently manufactures Hilson and Bentley pipes. Though, as with many brands owned by Gubbels, there’s a long history to it, especially being one of the very few major pipe brands to have come out of the Netherlands.

When a pipe is described as “Vintage,” it can mean all sorts of things, but for Big Ben, the vintage in question is the 1960s and ’70s. European pipes during this time—including the brands associated with Big Ben and Gubbels—tended to be light, slender, and broadly traditional, though often with an extra dash of elegance by way of trends set by the Danish artisan scene. This one is a featherweight stacked Dublin, for example, with a simple, warm brown finish and an equally simple vulcanite mouthpiece—a vintage I can certainly get behind.

This pipe is completely unsmoked, with an original bowl coating. Some very slight residual oxidation on the mouthpiece, though nothing major.

Details:

Length: 5.5″ / 139.7mm

Bowl Width: 0.74 / 18.79mm

Bowl Depth: 1.83″ / 46.48mm

Weight: 0.9oz / 26g