1963 Dunhill Tanshell 137 Sandblasted Dublin Estate Briar Pipe, English Estates

Description

To veteran pipe smokers, Dunhill needs no introduction. Beginning in 1907, Alfred Dunhill began selling Dunhill pipes at the tobacconist shop he owned on London’s Duke Street. Very quickly, these pipes gained the reputation of being the ‘Rolls-Royce’ of pipes due to how expertly crafted they were. Today, Dunhill is likely Britain’s most famous pipe manufacturer, and continues to produce some of the most treasured pipes a smoker can buy.

Dunhill’s mid-century shape “137” is by no means a common one. It was, as one Dunhill catalog put it, a part of the make’s “Collectors’ Range,” as opposed to other, “Classic” shapes, whose pipes were “less readily available” than the latter “due to limits imposed by the natural growth of the briar root.” Uncommonness in quantity was therefore a consequence of uncommonness in the pipe’s qualities: the shape is unconventionally long and tall for a Dunhill pipe, being over six inches in length despite being, in the case of this one, only a group 4 by Dunhill’s standards. Further still, the pipe is a rare Tanshell model from the 1960s, made from the specially-treated, dense Sardinian briar which gave the finish its signature appearance. Despite the pipe’s size and the materials used in its construction, it is almost unfathomably light, weighing just 24 grams.

The condition is very good. Some rim darkening.

 

Details:

Length: 6.2″ / 157.4mm

Bowl Width: 0.85 / 21.59mm

Bowl Depth: 1.6″ / 40.64mm

Weight: 0.8oz / 24g