New Mario Grandi tobacco pipe

[pugcasso]

The description says I can talk about smokes, so I shall...

This thread is about the new addition to my tobacco pipe collection.

This is a 'Mario Grandi' pipe. This is a hand-made one-of-a-kind brier pipe made in Italy by a small pipe production business. Each pipe is fully made by one craftsperson. The prices are very affordable for such a pipe (mine was $55). I had looked at their pipes for many months now and heard some good opinions on some youtube clips ... when I saw this one , I just had to get it.

I have one other newly-bought pipe (a Lorenzetti) but 8 other refurbished estate pipes. My first smoke of this Mario Grandi pipe (using 'King Charles' tobacco created on Jersey Island south of the UK ... not grown there of course) was good ... it has a better draw than most of my estate pipes and allowed more taste.













I think the brier wood has some nice grain and the sand-blasted (darker) areas of the block of brier are done nicely. The stem is a shiny reflective swirl of turquoise, lighter and darker shades.

They go by the name of futurepipes on ebay.

[punk_lawyer]

Cool pipe with excellent craftsmanship. Enjoy it!!!

[Jordan]

Sweet pipe, I've never seen a square shank or stem before.
Do you happen to have a link to the site?

[pugcasso]

Sweet pipe, I've never seen a square shank or stem before.
Do you happen to have a link to the site?

I think they list all their new pipes on ebay

Futurepipes (Mario Grandi) on ebay

They tend to have new pipes every day (and each is different ....I think one craftsman must just improvise making a pipe each day). I see a one other with a sort of similar angles square stem now.

[Woot22]

Very nice, I own a couple of Perterson and a couple of Vauen pipes that I really like. I will have to check out this company before I get a new one.

[thescot]

A very interesting pipe, pugcasso. In my smoking days, I loved a good pipe. I had a couple of Petersons among others. I hope you will enjoy your pipe;nothing better than a fine pipe and good tabacco before a fire on a cold winter evening. I liked my meershuam lined briar, the calabash, and the long stemmed clay pipe. They all smoked cool and dry.

But then, having been horribly addicted to tobacco (3 packs a day for 30 years or so) and having had to have a heart transplant, I find it important not to smoke. I figure if I smoke one cigarette or one pipe, I'd just as well go ahead and buy a carton. (You know the old saying: One is too many and a boat-load is not enough!)

But I surely do appreciate a good pipe. And yours stands up by itself with that square bottom. A nice touch.

[pugcasso]

A very interesting pipe, pugcasso. In my smoking days, I loved a good pipe. I had a couple of Petersons among others. I hope you will enjoy your pipe;nothing better than a fine pipe and good tabacco before a fire on a cold winter evening. I liked my meershuam lined briar, the calabash, and the long stemmed clay pipe. They all smoked cool and dry.

But then, having been horribly addicted to tobacco (3 packs a day for 30 years or so) and having had to have a heart transplant, I find it important not to smoke. I figure if I smoke one cigarette or one pipe, I'd just as well go ahead and buy a carton. (You know the old saying: One is too many and a boat-load is not enough!)

But I surely do appreciate a good pipe. And yours stands up by itself with that square bottom. A nice touch.

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Myself, I've never smoked a cigarette ... I started smoking pipes last year when I was 39 years old ... I remeber looking at E-pipes first actually (haha) and then after months decided to just try pipe and tobacco (remembering my uncle who smoked a pipe).

I tend to have one pipe bowl a day and skip a day now and then.

I don't feel much of a craving or dependence ... but a bowl of pipe tobacco really can alter the mood and adjust the state of mind/feeling (depending on the tobacco ...stronger nicotine examples being "Old Dublin" which coud induce a bit too odd of a feeling - so that is for my smaller-bowl-size pipes)

I've pondered the information about tobacco (safety, health) and have found mixed ideas. It seems that some earlier studies actually suggested that pipe smokers had an average longer lifespan than non-smokers!

Cigarettes, cigars and tobacco pipes should be considered differently (typically , cigarettes should be separately pondered from cigars/pipes)

I've read about how tobacco was a sacred plant to the native South and North Americas ... I've read how south America shamans would smoke tobacco for continuously for huge amounts of time (over a day or two ) and pretty much pass out (on he verge of death) and enter altered states and 'visit the gods' ..... not something I'd want to try to be honest ... but one bowl leaves e feeling a bit centered.


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Anyway....for whatever reason, I found my first smoke of this (using "King Charles" tobacco) gave a slightly better taste and smell even than a couple of my pipes I have (many of my estate pipes I got off ebay are smaller ... this pipe has a better draw).



Anyway ... enough babbling for now


I love pipes ..... or any nicely made creation (especially wood, fabric or metal)

[thescot]

[QUOTE=pugcasso;1045287. . .Cigarettes, cigars and tobacco pipes should be considered differently (typically , cigarettes should be separately pondered from cigars/pipes) . . . I love pipes ..... or any nicely made creation (especially wood, fabric or metal)[/QUOTE]

Ah, a wise man who knows how to control his habits. That's a mark of a gentleman. Starting to smoke a pipe at 39 is nothing like starting to smoke cigarettes at 12! Ha. I am glad to know that we are dealing with a grown man.

I am happy that you can enjoy your pipe, and I wish I could dare to do so. (Borkum Riff was one of my favorites along with a custom apple blend from the local tobacconer.) Again, that's a nice pipe.

[pugcasso]

Ah, a wise man who knows how to control his habits. That's a mark of a gentleman. Starting to smoke a pipe at 39 is nothing like starting to smoke cigarettes at 12! Ha. I am glad to know that we are dealing with a grown man.

I am happy that you can enjoy your pipe, and I wish I could dare to do so. (Borkum Riff was one of my favorites along with a custom apple blend from the local tobacconer.) Again, that's a nice pipe.

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I'm not sure it's the sign of a wise man being able to "control his habits" ... (I don't feel I have to control this as a habit) ... maybe because pipe smoking typically is less addictive than cigarettes.


I never really got exposed to cigarettes due to being somewhat of a hermit for quite a while LOL...

I have no idea of what cigarettes are like but perhaps they are more intense and feel differently since they are inhaled into the lungs (whereas pipes and cigars typically are not).

Cigarettes are quite different than pipe tobaccos in many ways (even the paper and adhesives in cigarettes play a part).

I sometimes feel maybe I shouldn't have started smoking the pipe.... but I also am a bit leary of "statistics" and the use of stats by various alleged experts and government-backed agencies (with who-knows-what agendas or financial backings by who-knows-what powerful sponsors and lobbyists )... often, similar government-backed agencies (eg... FDA) have passed substances which I feel are known toxins (at least in my opinion) ... Aspertame being a good example.


So, it comes down to a decision I made... and we shall see how it plays out in time (in this lifetime).


And so sometimes I tend to bypass the alleged experts of our current age and delve back in time to the ancient days.... the opinions of the residents of the earlier Americas (who used more natural tobaccos....and not cigarettes).


I know that Tobacco has a "spiritual power" .... I can feel how it gives me some centred calm feeling ..... I think/feel this is why it was a spiritually sacred plant to the ancients. Perhaps it can be used in a better way than our culture has typically used it.


I've found that pipe smoking is best done in a relaxed atmosphere and state of mind... it needs more care and attention (and ritual) than I have observed typically cigarette smokers extend to this plant.


Maybe it is our typical attitude towards this plant that is the main problem ... how the convenient and instant cigarette had become the dominant fashion in our culture ... bypassing the more careful , relaxed, meditative pipe.


Just my opinion....


(I don't mean to criticize cigarette smokers in comparison to pipe and cigar smokers... I just feel that there is a huge difference)


At any rate... even in the future if I give up smoking tobacco .... perhaps I will still collect pipes... and buy some tobaccos to just smell them haha.

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"I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgement in all human affairs." ~ Albert Einstein, 1950"


"…So it shall be for all time. If discord has broken out between two beings, let them smoke together. United by this bond, they will live in peace and friendship thereafter.”

~ Attributed to the Great Manitu, the Great Spirit."

[my research into the idea of the "Great Spirit" suggest that a better translation of that term is the "Great Mystery" ... personally I like this idea... the idea of the 'Ultimate Reality' as being *not comprehensible* by typical human rational thought and language (ie, symbolic language or limited symbol-based "box-like" intellectual expression of ideas) ... but by some irrational deeper experience that cannot be expressed in words]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"I don’t want any of your statistics; I took your whole batch and lit my pipe with it. I hate your kind of people. You are always ciphering out how much a man’s health is injured, and how much his intellect is impaired, and how many pitiful dollars and cents he wastes in the course of ninety-two years’ indulgence in the fatal practice of smoking; and in the equally fatal practice of drinking coffee; and in playing billiards occasionally; and in taking a glass of wine at dinner, etc. etc. And you are always figuring out how many women have been burned to death because of the dangerous fashion of wearing expansive hoops, etc. etc. You never see more than one side of the question.

You are blind to the fact that most old men in America smoke and drink coffee, although, according to your theory, they ought to have died young; and that hearty old Englishmen drink wine and survive it, and portly old Dutchmen both drink and smoke freely, and yet grow older and fatter all the time. And you never try to find out how much solid comfort, relaxation, and enjoyment a man derives from smoking in the course of a lifetime (which is worth ten times the money he would save by letting it alone), nor the appalling aggregate of happiness lost in a lifetime by your kind of people from not smoking. Of course you can save money by denying yourself all those little vicious enjoyments for fifty years; but then what can you do with it? What use can you put it to? Money can’t save your infinitesimal soul. All the use that money can be put to is to purchase comfort and enjoyment in this life; therefore, as you are an enemy to comfort and enjoyment where is the use of accumulating cash?" ~ Mark Twain

[Lime]

(I don't feel I have to control this as a habit)

I'm exactly the same; I love my pipe and genuinely enjoy a good smoke but I will go months at a time without even thinking of having a puff. On another day I will fancy a good smoke and enjoy a quiet evening having a few bowlfuls.

That pipe really is a beauty; I will keep an eye on the company.