Le Nuvole 2000 Natale 5 Cloud Smooth Dublin w/ Silver Estate Briar Pipe, Unsmoked

Description

Maurizio Tombari is one of the most interesting figures to emerge from the so-called “Pesaro school” of pipe making, which is a high bar to clear. Trained as a painter at Italy’s Accademia di Belle Art di Urbino, Tombari would ultimately join one of the founding pipe workshops of the Pesaro school, Mastro de Paja, working alongside its founders Giancarlo Guidi and Giannino Spadoni. After Guidi Mastro de Paja left to found Ser Jacopo with Bruto Sordini (another Mastro de Paja alum), Tombari joined him, working under Guidi until 1996. At this point, it was time for Tombari to depart again, this time with the intention of creating his own, independent pipe venture. But he would not be entirely on his own; like his former colleague Bruto Sordini, who had departed Ser Jacopo in the early 1990s to create Don Carlos pipes with his wife Rosaria, Maurizio Tombari was joined by his wife, Stefania, in his new endeavor. Together, Maurizio and Stefania Tombari created Le Nuvole, a partnership between two lifelong artists with a view to creating pipes as unique and harmonious as their meteorological namesake.

One interesting quirk about Italian pipe makers is their affinity for “Christmas Pipes,” i.e., special, limited edition pipes to mark the holiday season. While such pipes used to be quite popular around the world, the number of companies and artisans who still make them each year has, over the decades, dwindled to the point where you could count them on one hand. But the Italians, it seems, held out far longer than pipe makers from most other nations, with makes including Caminetto, Il Ceppo, Ascorti, and Radice offering Christmas, or Natale pipes through the 2000s and 2010s. The Tombaris’ Le Nuvole project has, similarly made Natale pipes over the years, often taking on designs that are even more beautiful than their “regular” counterparts, if you can believe it. This one very much conforms with the house style of Le Nuvole pipes, in the form of a wonderfully organic, and even quite floral, Dublin rendition, with straight grain circling its bowl and following the “lipped” contours of its rim. Being a special edition, it’s also mounted with an engraved, sterling silver army mount tying it to the occasion, an element of ornamentation that is otherwise quite rare on the Tombaris’ works.

This pipe is completely unsmoked, with an original bowl coating. It comes with its original box and sleeve.

Details:

Length: 6″ / 152.4mm

Bowl Width: 0.76 / 19.30mm

Bowl Depth: 1.47″ / 37.33mm

Weight: 1.3oz / 38g