Butz-Choquin BISTRO 1308 Smooth Bent

This reference example documents a Butz-Choquin pipe from the maker's BISTRO series, recorded under shape number 1308 and presented as a smooth-finished bent. The bent configuration — a bowl set at an angle to a curved shank-and-stem line — is among the most enduring forms in pipe making, prized for the way it settles the weight of the pipe toward the hand and jaw. The smooth finish leaves the surface of the stummel polished and unbroken, allowing the natural figure of the wood to read plainly across the bowl. Butz-Choquin occupies a substantial place in French pipe history. Over its long run the firm has issued an unusually broad catalogue of named series, of which BISTRO is one, each series pairing a house style with a range of numbered shapes — here, the 1308. Dating a Butz-Choquin pipe presents a familiar problem in French pipe scholarship: the factory has never employed a systematic date code of the kind found on certain English marques, so an individual example can rarely be pinned to a production year from its stampings alone. The series name and shape number identify what the pipe is, not when it was made. The record therefore rests on the owner's identification of brand, series, shape number, and French origin, with the era left deliberately undetermined.