Italian Pipe Production Panorama - part II

Let‘s start out from the Marche, where Giancarlo Guidi‘s Ser Jacopo immediately commands attention (we have already talked at length about the renewed Mastro de Paja workshop in previous issues). Here one immediately understands what the entire Italian pipe production could be like if its main criteria were innovation. The search for new shapes, carefully conducted by Guidi, is bringing a host of novelties- similar, in a way, to those that the best Danish pipe makers introduced after the last world war- capable of regenerating the often stagnant creativity which has relied either on repetitively unoriginal classics or reproductions of Mastro de Paja‘s first models. Giancarlo Guidi and- let‘s not forget him- Paolo Battistelli (the sandblasting master, among other qualities) are bringing forth new shapes, some of which have clearly broken free from the original "Mastro" influence. The renewal of shapes and finishes is also the winning card of the two artisans who have taken up the reins of the new Ceppo, abandoning the more commercial models and veering resolutely towards interesting novelties. Massimo Palazzi and Franco Rossi, along with the wife of Giorgio Imperatori (the prestigious and timid teacher of many of this region‘s pipe makers), are bringing new life to this old name. Unfortunately for us, however, we fear that these effects will be more visible abroad rather than in Italy. Just as in the Ser Jacopo workshop, here we not only noticed true creative fervour based on a precise notion about the models to be made (something which not all artisans know how to or want to do, preferring to shape briar block according to their whims), but also the variety of possible shapes that can be made due to the number of partially hewn pipes waiting to be finished in different baskets.
(to be continued...)

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