Herriot Pipes Smooth “Bell” Dublin w/ Horn Handmade Briar Pipe, New

In 2003, one of France’s preeminent pipe luminaries, Erwin Van Hove, jubilantly proclaimed, “Hallelujah! One of the very best American artisans has recently settled on French soil.” Two decades later, Antoine Grenard, director of Chapuis-Comoy and president of the Confrérie des Maîtres-Pipiers de Saint-Claude, oversaw the induction of another artisan originally from the Anglophone world into its hallowed brotherhood. Van Hove was, of course, welcoming Trever Talbert. The Confrérie, on the other hand, was welcoming Chris Herriot. Parallels between the two are difficult to ignore; both were outsiders who laid down roots in France and, crucially, thrived by it. Both forged connections with the Francophone pipe community, developing friendships and associations that would help them lay the foundations of their respective brands. And both would build something on these foundations that garnered them significant national and international acclaim. In Herriot’s case, this meant apprenticing under Bruno Nuttens (himself a former student of Pierre Morel and Tom Eltang), spending several days each week laboring in Nuttens’ Charpey workshop, and the rest of his time in his own. As someone with a firm background in traditional, Anglo-French design, Dublins have been a staple in Chris Herriot’s output since the early days of his career. While a number of his latrst renditions lean, to varying degrees, into Danish, or Scandinavian, styles, this one sticks close to the classics. One would call it an “English Dublin,” or, better yet, a “Bell Dublin,” leaning as it does closely into the shaping conventions followed by English pioneers like Reuben Charatan in the early 20th century. Another similarity between Herriot’s pipe and Charatan’s is, of course, the grain, and though Reuben was far from the only company man to have recognized the significance of the “straight grain pipe,” I can’t help but think that he would be quite taken with this one, given its stellar combination of form and finish.   Details: Length: 5.2″ / 132.0mm Bowl Width: 0.76 / 19.30mm Bowl Depth: 1.65″ / 41.91mm Weight: 0.9oz / 26g