Hey everybody, I'm Shane Ireland, and it's one of my favorite times of the year: It's time for our American Pipe-Making Exposition 2023. The American Pipe-Making Exposition is an annual event where we ask for submissions from some of our American carvers, submissions designed to push the limits of their comfort zones and the limits of pipe design in general, and all of this is tied together by a theme or a prompt that we provide. For 2023's American Pipe-Making Exposition, we are returning to a previous theme from 2018: alternate materials.

Alternate materials are pretty straightforward. The only qualification for this particular entry into the American Exposition is that the pipe be made from something other than briar. We can have a briar chamber, though, so a pipe in an alternate material that may not be suitable for smoking on its own can be lined with briar. But what this event is meant to do is to push everyone to use something that they're not accustomed to — maybe a material that's challenging or that hasn't been used in this way before — and to get completely outside of the box to push the limits and the boundaries of modern pipe making. Let's see what they've done.

Micah Cryder — Smooth Boxwood Paneled Bent Dublin with Cocobolo and Brass

This year's submission from Micah Cryder of Yeti Pipes is a bent Dublin made of boxwood and cocobolo wood. It's a panel design that focuses on structure and the beauty of the materials. The cocobolo's dark-walnut color palette contrasts nicely against the yellow hue of the boxwood, and the panels and the precision that Yeti has crafted this pipe with is top tier. You'll notice close up how there are these very imperceptible panels accenting the lines even more so than the obvious panels along the bowl.

Also noteworthy are the shape and the structure of the shank and the heel. Micah has executed these almost dovetail-looking joints that connect the cocobolo and the boxwood. The angle of both the heel and the shank do a really nice job of matching one another, adding some cohesion to the overall design. Lastly, he's gone a step further and accented the piece with brass pins inset in the rim, shank, and heel — the ones on the shank and the heel are actually functional — helping to secure the materials to the boxwood stummel. It's a ton of exacting line work, super precise engineering, and a really aesthetically gorgeous piece, as well as a feat of craftsmanship. Micah always seeks to push himself as a craftsman, even beyond what he's already capable of, and this is a great feather in his cap for this year's expo.

Ryan Alden — Sandblasted Morta Apple

Ryan Alden's entry in the expo this year is a really nice pipe and I love this shape from him. It's a classic Apple shape, very much a Ryan Alden shape. But he's fashioned it from morta, and it's a really nice block of beautifully sandblasted morta.

The geometric grain patterns on this pipe are impressive and the orientation is masterful. We have all of this ring grain and cross grain, but also a very light blast, so you get this really tactile responsiveness.

It isn't super craggy. I think the spherical shape of the bowl fits nicely in the hand. Paired to this jet-black palette is a shimmery acrylic accent of cobalt blue that ties into the composition really nicely. I think this is a King grade. It's a really nice piece from Ryan.

Pete Prevost — Partially Sandblasted Olivewood Author

For this year's American Exposition, Pete has submitted a solid olivewood pipe. I'll get back to the interplay of texture here in a minute, but what I really like is that it's super clear who made this pipe. It really supports Pete's aesthetic, and in a lot of ways we now define the American aesthetic collectively around a handful of these guys in the modern American pipe-making scene.

It's basically tightly knit. These muscular, typically somewhat minimalist renditions of classic shapes are in a particularly Danish style. Now, what I really love about this is, first, he's chosen a really interesting configuration for the grain. We end up with what is effectively a crosscut olivewood block rendering beautiful rings with a lot of variation in color.

What's interesting here is that Pete has played with texture and juxtaposed the grain of the olivewood, which is figured very, very heavily with an actual sandblasted texture here on this side to give you an idea of what the different cross sections look like in that material. It's a super-cool effect. It gives this pipe just a little bit of something extra and also showcases the material with more than one type of finishing. Really solid stuff.

Abe Herbaugh — Smooth Olivewood Horn with Horn

Abe Herbaugh's submission is this nicely compact Horn, a shape we've actually seen from Abe before, only in briar. For the Expo this year, though, he has crafted it from a gorgeous block of olivewood. And not only is it Abe's first-ever olivewood pipe, but according to him, it's also his only olivewood pipe, so it's definitely a rare piece and one that really showcases his talents as an artist and as an artisan.

It's accented with a really nice piece of horn. Originally, I thought it was musk ox horn because of how pristine, clear, and creamy it is. It gave off that musk ox horn type of color. However, it's regular cow horn, which usually has darker gradients mixed in. But Abe found a really nice piece that is perfectly and consistently creamy throughout and does a really nice job of matching the lighter tones of the olivewood.

As for olivewood, typically we find really eccentric grain patterns that don't maintain any sort of consistent direction. However, he oriented the olivewood in such a way that it beautifully matches the gesture and the shaping of the horn shape itself. It has a really nice symmetry, which we don't often find with olivewood, making this piece stand out even more, especially with the stunning smooth finish. It's a really nice shape from Abe, one that we've seen before in briar, but this piece is even more special because it's made from olivewood and is the first ever Abe Herbaugh olivewood pipe.

Jared Coles — "The Pipe" Billiard with Orangewood

Jared Coles, another one of the veterans of our American Pipe Making Exposition, did something really interesting this year. This has got to be one of my favorite pieces. This is a tribute to — and I'm going to have to use air quotes here — "The Pipe." For those of you who don't know, there was a brand called "The Pipe" back in the day; the body of the pipe, the bowl, in fact, was made from a composite material. I can't remember exactly what it was. I should have checked a moment ago, but it came in all of these really vibrant colors. [They were plastic with pyrolytic graphite tobacco chambers, a heat-resistant material used in rocket nosecones of the day.]

Of course, because it was a composite, it didn't have wood grain. There's a lot of fans of these pipes out there and Jared decided to make his own version. The interesting thing about this is, even though the outside of the pipe is made from an epoxy resin that has been cast and colored by Jared himself, the internals of the pipe are actually a briar Billiard. So, essentially what he's done here is shape a pipe, cast it in resin in this epoxy, and then reshape it again and work it down to a high shine.

It's a really interesting material to work with. I think the visual effects are great. It's going to be hard to appreciate this fully in a video or a photo as much as in real life. It's accented with orangewood, which I think is a really nice juxtaposition between the epoxy material and a more natural material, sort of tying that back down to its roots as a briar pipe. Again, smoking qualities should be just like a regular briar Billiard. It's a really lovely shape and wonderfully made out of an alternate material.

Scott Thile — Sandblasted Strawberry Wood Bent Bulldog with Spalted Tamarind

Next we have a truly iconic entry into the expo this year from Scott Thile. We have his signature Bulldog shape, but he's employed not one but two different materials: strawberry wood, of course, which Scott has played around with quite a lot, and spalted tamarind. We have the top of this Bulldog using spalted tamarind.

The inside of the chamber is strawberry wood and the accent of the stem is also spalted tamarind. I think this light, very natural color palette paired with the darker-stained strawberry wood is really interesting. The spalted grain of the tamarind contrasts with the undulating, wavy patterns of the strawberry wood, and they work really nicely together. I think these are also two mediums that Scott has worked with quite a lot, but pairing them together in this way with a very iconic shape is frankly just beautiful.

It's a great representation of Scott's style, and execution-wise, it's excellent. There's the bead lines on the spalted tamarind, which are very difficult to do, and they all look great. I really like the beveling on top and the myriad different patterns of grain and texture to this piece. I like that Scott showcased not only two different types of wood, but different finishes in a standout piece.

Adam Davidson — Leather Calabash with Boxwood and Gold

Adam Davidson's submission is this Calabash made of leather and boxwood. Now, when it comes to our American Expositions of the past, Adam has always sought to outdo himself from previous years. He views these expos as sort of a haute couture fashion show for showing off incredibly avant-garde designs like we might see from the high fashion houses, stuff that you wouldn't wear on the street per se, but meant to impress on the runway.

That's exactly what Adam's delivered once again this year. While seemingly unassuming on the outside, this pipe is not wrapped in leather as many pipes have been in decades past, and still today, but it's crafted entirely and only from leather. There is no briar here, there is no wood. Underneath here, giving shape to the stummel, this is made entirely from leather with a boxwood cap and a boxwood mount on the shank. It's then stitched together with 14-karat gold staples that Adam handset into the leather to close it up and seal the two halves together.

In making this pipe, Adam invested many hours preparing and ultimately crafting it. I have a piece of leather that he gave me that shows how thick this raw leather was when he started crafting it. Before he could even work with the leather, he had to create a mold from mahogany that he then cut in half and used to shape the leather so that it would retain the Calabash shape. Soaking the leather, wrapping it around, tightening it, and scratching it over the mahogany mold, he then baked it, hardened it, set it to that shape, and then connected the two halves together via these gold staples.

The boxwood is equally impressive. Boxwood doesn't come in very large blocks, so a block large enough to shape a cap of this size is quite impressive and rare in and of itself. It's also boxwood that he got from Nanna Ivarsson a number of years back. It's beautifully glossed and shiny and exhibits tons of interesting grain, character, and individuality. I'm going to take the cap off here. Everything is as expected from Adam: top of the line craftsmanship. Everything is tapered to fit perfectly with each part. It's lined with cork on the inside all the way through the stummel, not just where the cap sets in, with leather on the outside and cork lining the inside to help preserve the leather as the pipe is smoked.

There's more boxwood right underneath the rim for added structure and to help retain the shape. It's one of those pieces that you have to look at for 10-15 minutes to fully comprehend, understand, and appreciate all of the work and skill that went into it. It's a stunning piece from Adam. It's also the first Calabash he's ever made. Great first Calabash. Not sure how he's ever going to make a better Calabash than this in the future, or if he even plans to make another one. It's a preeminent piece from Adam and stunning work from one of America's most experienced artisans.

Todd Johnson — The Conch

I'm nearly speechless here. This happened in 2018 as well. In fact, Todd is revisiting his personal submission for the alternate materials original Exposition in 2018, which is the first time that we saw him create a nautilus from an actual nautilus shell. Back then, he carefully constructed the internals from briar and fitted them into the shell, and he's done something even more grand this time. Revisiting that theme and actually taking it a step further. I believe what we have here is a real natural conch. This is straight up pulled out of the ocean and transformed into a very smokable tobacco pipe.

For alternate materials, I think he's taken the theme very seriously once again this year. Also, in general, the entire package — the stand, the chosen shell or medium for this pipe — is inspired by William Golding's classic novel, 1954's Lord of the Flies. I won't get into that here because we don't have enough time, but this is beautiful work. The pieces that nature contributed to this, shown in a beautiful conch, aren't the only aspects making this a great work: Todd constructed internals to a very tight tolerance, made from briar, and he has incorporated them seamlessly into the shell itself. It's hard to see where the sculpting and the painting ends and where nature's work begins.

I'll separate this so we can all see a very sturdy and very durable military mount-style stem extension with an actual traditional mortise and tenon. So again, same thing. If you do not have the stem placed in this, you are just looking at a near flawless conch shell. I don't think there can be much more said about this particular piece, except that I am in awe of the overall execution and craftsmanship. Truly one of the most stunning pipes I've seen.

Micah Redmond — Smooth Boxwood Scoop with Bakelite

This year's submission from Micah Redmond is this Scoop-shape made from boxwood paired to a Bakelite stem. Micah's shaping style often favors rounded squat forms, if you will, with bowls that are compressed vertically. You often see that in his signature Tomato renditions, and he employed the same shaping cues with this Scoop, but gave it a more pointed fore that urges the shape forward. It gives it a little bit of a sleeker and more aerodynamic aesthetic.

As mentioned, it's fashioned entirely of boxwood instead of briar, and it's a gorgeous piece of boxwood too. Boxwood doesn't always have the consistent grain of briar, but he's oriented the block in a really nice way that shows the growth rings curving up the side quite consistently on both flanks and leaves a smooth and plain base in the center.

The grain fans out on either side, which is rare in boxwood. We don't see such consistent patterns very often. With Micah's pipes, you'll often see him use Bakelite, and he has done that once again here, making this entirely from non-traditional materials. The color is a pleasing, deep mauve, a purple hue with some swirls in it, and that adds a pop of color to the natural tones of the boxwood. It's a really cool piece, one that fits well into Micah's style and is perfect for this year's Expo.

Silver Gray — Sherlock Holmes Gourd Calabash with Meerschaum and Morta (with Tamper)

Next up: Silver Gray. Silver sent us a Calabash this year, and it's interesting because she's really gone old school with it. This is a traditional gourd Calabash, which is the iconic shape that we would often see carried by Sherlock Holmes in theater productions and silver screen adaptations. It's very iconically tied with that character. Silver has jumped into that theme here.

Not only do we have this very iconic gourd Calabash silhouette, but the finishing here is what's really unique: we have a traditional cap of meerschaum and inside is the cooling chamber from the gourd. At the very back here, she's actually incorporated a mount of morta, and that's going to increase stabilization and durability. It also just looks really cool. It's a smooth-finished piece of morta. A lot of people sandblast morta because it has that very unique grain pattern, but I think when it's smooth, it's really interesting too. You can see these deep undulations of grain and the cross section is really nice as well.

Going back to the finish here, she's stamped iconic titles, places, and themes from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes novels, short stories, and different things like that on the pipe. You have this iconic homage to Sherlock Holmes in a shape that is very much associated with Sherlock Holmes. You also have all these reminders, branded clues, hints, and tributes to all these different stories.

To accompany this work of art, Silver's also created a beautiful tamper with plateau and some sandblasted grain as well with a very lightly sandblasted and smooth foot, and that works really nicely with this piece. She's also included a custom-made leather bag and snap enclosure. It has compartments for breaking down the pipe and will hold both the Calabash and the stem, as well as the plateau tamper. It's just a gorgeous piece from Silver. I really love the homage to this literary theme. It's very much on brand and on theme. Yeah, just a killer piece from Silver.

Bill Shalosky — Sandblasted Olivewood Apple with Juma and Fordite

Bill has submitted a solid olivewood Tomato, or Apple, for this year's exposition. It's very robust, maybe even a little oversized by his standards. Again, when we think of the modern American aesthetic — industrial, muscular, and influenced heavily by the Danish movement — this is what we think of in terms of shaping in most modern American pipe making.

I really love the decision to orient the grain sort of vertically, if you will, and to sandblast this. You end up with a ring-grain olivewood pipe that is super dense, has beautiful coloring, and beautiful figuring. The finish and the sandblast are masterfully done. Any deeper and it would've ruined the shape.

This pipe has a lot both in terms of a tactile feel and visual attractiveness. I particularly enjoy not only the combination of the natural olivewood and the Juma stem, but Bill's signature Fordite ring really echoes the tight, dense rings in variation and in the figuring of the olivewood itself. It's super cool and is a pipe that I would smoke like crazy.

David Huber — Glowfish Ultima

David Huber's submission is what he has dubbed The Glowfish Ultima. If you followed our past expos or David's work in general, you're probably familiar with his Glowfish designs, which are Blowfish renditions that he has accented with glow-in-the-dark accents with a compound called HyperGlow. It typically is in this confetti format that's a mosaic, technicolor-like showcase.

What he's done with this piece is extend that HyperGlow compound to the entire pipe, meaning the whole pipe, from stem to stummel, glows in the dark. To accomplish this, David had to do a lot of research and development. He learned how to cast, casting an entire block of this glow-in-the-dark HyperGlow resin and treating it like a block of briar, sanding it down on sanding wheels, drilling it for the mortise and the chamber, and basically treating it as if it were briar but using this synthetic HyperGlow material. This process took a toll on his tools as well. It's harder and denser than briar, so he had to change sanding discs and change out drill bits, which just took a lot of time, materials, and labor. The stem is also infused with HyperGlow. It's made of acrylic with the HyperGlow resin, and he's put a briar chamber in here. Even though the pipe is completely non-traditional and completely avant-garde, it does still have the smoking properties of a briar pipe.

As for the shape: it's a lovely Fish rendition in the style of Lars Ivarsson. You've got this bulbous, Apple-like bowl flaring out into this broad shank and then a teardrop ridgeline follows the shank and curves all the way up the bowl. It's a really iconic Lars Ivarsson-style shape, and Lars is an artisan that David has respected and given homage to in other pieces. He's done that again here.

This piece happened to be David's 700th pipe and he appropriately gave it his highest grade of Bull. It's a stunning piece from a shaping perspective as well as from a craftsmanship perspective. Created through learning new skills and developing new techniques on the fly, it's turned out to be a stunning piece and a jewel in David's portfolio. So, stunning work, David. Thank you so much. And whenever you get this pipe, make sure to turn off the lights.

There you have it. That does it for the 2023 American Pipe-Making Exposition. I want to thank everybody who submitted their incredible work this year. Check them out at Smokingpipes, and check out the blog post on our Daily Reader. Please let the carvers and us know what you think. See you next year, guys.