Ib Loran (for Pipe Dan) Smooth “West Pocket” Dublin (Estate

Along with WO Larsen and Suhr’s Pibemageri, Pibe-Dan (later known as Pibe Dan) was one of the foundational workshops in the emergence of post-war Danish pipe-making. Founded in 1943 by H. Dan-Christensen, Pipe Dan not only sold the pipes of pioneering Scandinavian pipe-makers, such as Sixten Ivarsson, Sven Knudsen and Preben Holm, it employed many of these seminal figures to make Pibe Dan brand pipes. These included Gert Holbek, Ib Loran, Ph. Vigen, and a young Tom Eltang. Pipe Dan closed in 1991, but its impact as an institution on the world of handmade pipes is as strongly felt as ever.

This particular pipe was made in the Pibe-Dan workshop by one of its longest serving in-house carvers, and a pioneer in the emergence of the “Danish” approach to pipe design, the aforementioned Ib Loran. It is a curious work to say the very least, though its name gives some indication as to why it takes on the form that it does. This was Loran’s reinterpretation of the traditional Anglo-French “vest pocket” pipe (in Danish, “W” is pronounced like the English “V”), with the expressed intention being that one could rotate the mouthpiece to face inwards and stow it in one’s jacket when not in use, just like a traditional one would. Being a forward-thinking pipe designer, however, Loran wanted to make the pipe his own, and possibly even to fit with the house style of Pibe-Dan, where stacked, conical shapes were especially favored.

The condition is very good, and quite remarkable for a pipe that I’d presume was made in the 1960s. Some very small scratches and slight handling marks.

Details:

Length: 4.5″ / 114.3mm

Bowl Width: 0.81 / 20.57mm

Bowl Depth: 2.08″ / 52.83mm

Weight: 1.5oz / 44g