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Brand Dating Guides
W.Ø. Larsen was a Copenhagen tobacco shop with its own pipe workshop from the early 1960s.
Updated 2026-10-07
Welcome. If your pipe says W.Ø. Larsen, this guide helps you place it in time.
W.Ø. Larsen was a famous tobacco shop in Copenhagen, Denmark.
It stood on Strøget, the long walking street of the city, at Amagertorv 9.
In the early 1960s the shop opened its own pipe workshop.
Ø is a Danish letter. Many sellers write it as O, so W.O. Larsen is the same name.
Our facts come from two Pipedia pages, one pipephil.eu page and our own notes on the Bentley brand.
Pipedia is an online pipe encyclopedia. Pipephil.eu is a website of pipe stamps and logos.
Each rule has a rank: high, medium or low. High means strong, agreed evidence.
Medium means one good source or a general rule. Low means a wide range or a weak hint.
An honest word first: this brand has few dating clues. Our sources give no year code for its stamps.
The early 1960s
In the 1960s Danish handmade pipes became very popular.
At first the shop sold pipes by other Danish carvers.
Pipedia names Sixten Ivarsson, Sven Knudsen, Poul Rasmussen and Brakner. Pipephil.eu gives the full name Peter Brakner.
The store manager, Svend Bang, urged the owner, Ole Larsen, to make pipes in the shop itself.
Svend Bang later started his own pipe brand, S. Bang.
The first workshop was in the shop basement, or in rooms next to the store. The two Pipedia texts differ here.
Later the workshop moved to the old Larsen cigar factory. Pipedia and pipephil.eu agree on this.
Shop catalogues survive for 1960-61, 1961-62 and 1963. So the workshop began around 1960.
From 1962 to 1986
The first workshop manager was Sven Knudsen. He soon left to make pipes under his own name.
Next came Hans Nielsen, known as Former. Our Bentley notes say he was hired in 1962.
Under Former the workshop grew. The Select and Straight Grain series came from his shop.
Carvers who worked there include Teddy Knudsen, Tonni Nielsen, Jess Chonowitsch and Peter Hedegaard.
Else Larsen, Denmark's first woman pipe maker, learned there. So did Poul Ilsted and Ph. Vigen.
In 1986 Former went to Switzerland and created the Bentley brand. Our Bentley notes give this year.
After Former, Søren Refbjerg Rasmussen ran the workshop.
Benni Jørgensen, a student of Teddy Knudsen, then made the Straight Grain pipes.
Pipedia says that for most W.Ø. Larsen pipes we do not know the carver.
When Ole Larsen's health failed, his son Nils took over.
Nils wanted to sell cheaper pipes. He bought the Georg Jensen pipe factory to make them.
Pipedia calls this a fatal error. In the end the W.Ø. Larsen name was sold to Stanwell.
Stanwell then made pipes called Larsen in its own factory. No source we read gives the year of the sale.
Pipephil.eu says the shop at Amagertorv 9 closed for good on 31 December 2004. This is one source only.
One point does not fit. Pipedia's Georg Jensen page says that factory closed in 2001.
That page does not mention Larsen. So we cannot yet date the purchase by Nils Larsen.
Read the shank first. Common stamps are W.Ø. LARSEN with HANDMADE or MADE IN DENMARK.
Pipephil.eu shows one pipe stamped W.Ø. Larsen, Handmade, Black 325, 01. No source explains these numbers.
Another pipe there has W.Ø. Larsen, Handmade, Made in Denmark underneath, and Danish Gold on top.
Some shanks carry a logo of a smoker in an armchair. The same logo was printed on the boxes.
One stem on pipephil.eu has a white dot on each of its four sides.
Line and grade words seen on these pipes: Select, Straight Grain, Pearl, Super, and Sandblast with horn.
A Straight Grain may carry a further grade, such as 10, F or Pearl.
A Super may carry a number, such as Super 119 or Super 81.
No source we read ranks these grades or gives their years.
The house style: classic shapes made a little fuller and rounder, with a low centre of gravity.
Yellow and orange finishes were common.
Larsen alone is not W.Ø. Larsen. Jørgen Larsen, Jørn Larsen and Else Larsen were Danish carvers with their own names.
Gudbrand Larsen of Lillehammer, in Norway, is another maker again. Pipephil.eu warns not to mix these names.
The brand Larsen and Stigart is a separate name, not W.Ø. Larsen.
A pipe called Larsen may come from Stanwell, after the name was sold. We do not know how Stanwell stamped them.
Bentley is Former's own later brand, not a W.Ø. Larsen. Bentley pipes were made in Switzerland and Germany, not Denmark.
Some online titles show W.. Larsen. A computer lost the Ø letter. It is the same name.
One Pipedia photo shows a pipe stamped 121 AR, said to mean 121 years, from 1985.
We have only this one example. So we do not date pipes by it yet.
This brand gives a first possible year, not an exact year.
W.Ø. LARSEN (also written W.O. LARSEN)
The workshop began in the early 1960s. Stanwell kept making Larsen pipes after it bought the name, so there is no end year.
What We Don't Know Yet
Published deliberately. If you hold the catalogue, hallmarked example, or period document that closes one of these gaps, write to us — corrections are credited. Every open question across the encyclopedia is gathered on the Open Questions page.
Changelog
Sources
Holding a W.Ø. Larsenyou can't place? Our shelves usually hold a few — documented to this same standard.
W.Ø. Larsen in the Shop