Ropp Cherry De Luxe 913, French Estate

This reference example documents a Ropp Cherry De Luxe, shape 913, an estate pipe from France entered into the archive as a representative of one of that country's most distinctive pipemaking traditions. The Cherry De Luxe designation places the pipe within Ropp's celebrated line, the material upon which the firm built much of its reputation. Where the great majority of European pipes of the last century and a half were turned from Mediterranean burl, Ropp championed the wood of the cherry tree, frequently leaving passages of natural bark on the bowl exterior to advertise the material honestly. offers a lighter weight than and a character all its own, and Ropp's cherry pipes became something of a signature export of French pipecraft. The house of Ropp traces its origins to Eugène Ropp in the later nineteenth century, and the marque endured as a significant French producer through the twentieth century before its trademarks eventually passed into the orbit of the Chapuis-Comoy concern in Saint-Claude, the historic centre of the French pipe industry. Throughout its independent existence the firm produced enormous quantities of workmanlike pipes alongside its dressier De Luxe grades, of which this example, carrying the model number 913 from the factory's shape chart, is one. Dating a Ropp presents the difficulty common to nearly all French factory pipes: the house employed no date-code system of the kind familiar from certain English makers, and its nomenclature identifies line and shape rather than year. Attribution therefore rests on the brand and line names themselves, which situate the pipe within Ropp's twentieth-century production. The archive accordingly records the era as an open bracket, letting the marque and model designation carry the historical weight.