Nording Signature Freehand

Many years ago I went to Tupelo, MS with my now ex-wife to visit some of her friends from college. I honestly can't remember much of that trip, other than one of her friends was a smoker and picked up this pipe several years before. He never quite got into pipe smoking and so it had sat on a shelf collecting dust for at least 2 years. When I arrived, busting out my two Peterson pipes, it instantly started conversations about pipe smoking. In the end, he gifted me his old pipe and I've been using it regularly ever since. 

These are not the best pictures, but they're all I have at the moment. I believe this pipe was one of the earliest signed models. From what I've read on the subject, Erik Nording started carving pipes as a demonstration at pipe shows. Those were freehand and unstained pipes which he signed and gave or sold to individuals at the shows. This led to a signature series, all handmade by Erik himself, despite that he has a whole crew of master craftsmen today. It can pretty much be assumed that any with a stain were made at his factory, but the natural ones may or may not have been created under the gaze of spectators. Regardless, this is one of the earlier factory models (I'm 95% sure). 

As you can see, the sides are smooth, with only the top edge of the bowl being rusticated and a little deliberate unevenness at the edge of the shank where the tenon is inserted. You can see the signature along the left side of the shank.

The right side is actually large than the left, looking down the stem and shank, there is a significant bulge to the right side. This is if you keep the top of the bowl flat. If you realign the pipe so that the shank and stem appear to be centered on the bowl, the top is at least a 15° drop from the right to the left. Also, the tenon hole was partially misdrilled, 

The chamber itself is fairly substantial, for me anyway. I actually have a low tolerance for nicotine, so I stick to lower nicotine content tobaccos. However, this size bowl if smoked completely in one sitting, would be too much for me, even with a mild tobacco.

It might sound like I'm complaining about this pipe, but on the contrary, it is one of my absolute favorites. The pipe feels good in the hand with it's uneven yet smooth shape. It isn't too heavy and benefits greatly from the vulcanite stem, making it much more comfortable to simply rest in my teeth compared to any of my other similarly sized pipes. It has broken in quite well (it had no cake when I got it). Because it doesn't have a polish, I'm less worried if I bang it on something, it's just a regular pipe, no frills, and I carry it a lot. In my first post I mentioned the Peterson pipes that I use all the time, but I can say that this one is definitely used more than the bent bulldog. The previous owner did clumsily char the lip and I've been unable to clean it, so this is one pipe where I am less careful as well. When I die, this will likely be the pipe that people look at and say "it must have been his favorite" because it will look the most abused :-) 

Happy Puffing!

TAB