Charatan’s Make Reuben Era Freehand Relief Sandblasted Freehand Estate Briar Pipe, English Estates

Description

While Dunhill may be Britain’s most famous pipe brand, Charatan is not only older, but has the honor of being the first to have made its pipes entirely in-house. ‘Charatan’s Make’ referred to the fact that, at a time when other pipe companies were sourcing stummels and stems carved from other companies before assembling them in their factories and workshops, Charatan made every part of their pipes on the Charatan premises. So began a legacy of high-quality pipe-making under the Charatan name, one whose employees, at one time or another, included Joel Sasieni, and Ken Barnes and Barry Jones of James Upshall fame.

F. Charatan & Son was rather late to the sandblasting game, all things considered. In fact, when they were introduced during the Reuben Era, the blasting process itself was outsourced to a window glazing company. Ultimately, Charatan brought sandblasting in-house, and with the inauguration of its freehand workshop in the 1950s, the iconic Free Hand Relief was born. Long before any of its English or American contemporaries, and indeed long before such designs became vogue in the artisan scene, Charatan was manufacturing craggy, hand-turned re-imaginings of traditional shapes, like this tall, plateaux-topped Dublin. Looking at it, I am quite struck by how much it appears to prefigure some of the pipes of Lee Von Erck and J.T. Cooke, for example. This is especially impressive given that this pipe will have been made all the way back in the 1950s, during the last years of Reuben Charatan’s tenure at the helm of the company, which is evinced by the pipe’s nomenclature and tapered ebonite stem.

The condition is very good. Slight inner rim darkening and some handling marks.

Details:

Length: 6″ / 152.4mm

Bowl Width: 0.89 / 22.60mm

Bowl Depth: 1.71″ / 43.43mm

Weight: 1.5oz / 44g