David S. Huber Sandblasted Blowfish Estate Briar Pipe, American Estates

Description

Few pipe-makers can claim such a meteoric rise as David S. Huber. While Huber only began making pipes in 2010, doing so as a hobbyist while working as a freelance designer, it would not be long before demand for DSH pipes allowed him to commit to making them full time. Huber’s avant-garde approach to shaping makes his pipes unlike almost anything else on the market, while his mentorship from other carvers, including  Jeff “J. Alan” Gracik, Tom Eltang, Per & Ulf of S. Bang, Hans “Former” Nielsen, and Nanna Ivarsson, has ensured that such daring aesthetics are accompanied by the level of technical precision that pulling them off necessitates.

I cannot tell you how much of a joy it always is to get up close and personal with one of David Huber’s pipes. They are just so different. Take this one from 2022, for example: it is recognizably a blowfish, with the shape’s signature, flattened sides and narrow cross-section. On the other hand, the bowl almost looks as if it’s been rotated 90 degrees, in relation to the conventional blowfish shape, adding an extraordinary verticality to the design. It is also, somewhat like the Japanese masters, decidedly asymmetrical, in a way that even the conventional blowfish isn’t. As a last touch, the off-angle, convex rim lends an organicism befitting the essential shape – as if it really was an aquatic creature, head tilted toward the surface of the water above.

 

Details:

Length: 4.2″ / 106.6mm

Bowl Width: 0.76 / 19.30mm

Bowl Depth: 1.34″ / 34.03mm

Weight: 1.1oz / 32g