Poul Winslow Crown Collector Smooth Freehand Estate Briar Pipe, Unsmoked [SOLD]

Description

As is often the case with the greats of Danish pipe-making, the story of Poul Winsløw begins as one of a master and an apprentice. That master was none other than Preben Holm; the apprentice was a young Winsløw. Holm held Winsløw in especial regard, with the latter ending up as the former’s head assistant in the Preben Holm workshop. After Holm’s untimely passing, Winsløw went solo, and after surviving the slump in the Danish pipes market in the 1980s and early 1990s, he emerged as one of Denmark’s – and the world’s – premier freehand pipe-makers.

We might wonder what would have happened if Preben Holm had not passed at such a young age (43), and what his pipes would have looked like, had he the time to develop his skills even further. I’ve certainly thought about it. But I also think, in a sense, we already have the answer, when I look at the pipes of Poul Winsløw. Winsløw seems to not only have learned how to hand-shape briar and to follow grain patterns just as expertly as Holm, but to have taken this expertise even further. In his letter-graded (A, B, C, etc.) pipes, Winsløw tends to add more by way of color and decorative elements to his pipes, but in the Crown-graded series, the designs are stripped down to the fundamentals of the Danish freehand. This particular Crown is a Collector grade, the highest grade in the Crown series; the appellation, I think you’ll agree, is more than adequate.

This Collector is also completely unsmoked. It came to us via our trade-in program, and funnily enough, its last owner was a passionate collector of high-grade pipes.

 

Details: 

Length: 6″ / 152.4mm

Bowl Width: 0.94 / 23.87mm

Bowl Depth: 1.39″ / 35.30mm

Weight: 2.3oz / 66g