Charatan’s Make Reuben Era Special 348 Smooth Pot 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 (who went on to work at Dunhill, before leaving again to start the Sasieni make), Dan Tennison, Stan Haney (later of Ashby Hall), and Ken Barnes and Barry Jones (later of James Upshall).

While Charatan remains famous for its straight grain pipes, there was still a place within the make’s grading schemes for other kinds of beautiful briar patterns. The Special was one such grade. Introduced in the first half of the 20th century, during Reuben Charatan’s time at the helm of F. Charatan & Son (known as the “Reuben era,” or “Reuben’s era”), the Special grade was one of “Premier quality pipes, cut in “cross grain,” “bird’s eye,” or, as it seems in the case of this one, quite remarkable flame grain, with a dash of bird’s-eye on its right flank.

The pipe happens to have been made under Reuben’s tenure, too, as evinced by its shape code (“348,” sans the “DC” or “X” that were used in the Lane era to strictly delineate Double Comfort from non-Double Comfort designs) and absence of a Lane Ltd. symbol (though, in this instance, even if it were present, the shape code would indicate it as being a late Reuben era make, from a time when Lane held exclusive US distribution rights, marking those pipes accordingly). The shape itself looks to be a group 3 “48,” which, as was typical of Reuben’s designs, had a somewhat unusual name, the “Chubby,” though for reasons that are fairly evident from the design.

The condition is great. It does not appear to have been smoked much. Some slight finish fading and residual oxidation on the mouthpiece.

Details:

Length: 6.1″ / 154.9mm

Bowl Width: 1.03 / 26.16mm

Bowl Depth: 1.46″ / 37.08mm

Weight: 1.7oz / 50g