1997 Schneiderwind Jahrespfeife Brebbia Pura Bent Billiard Sterling Silver Cap Unsmoked

A shop in Aachen has been selling pipes since 1846. Once a year, they made their own.

From 1987, Pfeifen-Schneiderwind of Aachen ordered a small run of pipes each year carrying their own name - a Jahrespfeife, the pipe of the year. Not a catalogue order. You walked into that shop, and that year, this is what they had made. Stanwell one year. Bentley another.

For 1997 they went to Italy.

The shank is stamped BREBBIA, MADE IN ITALY, and PURA. Brebbia has been cutting briar at Bosco Grosso di Brebbia, in Varese, since 1947 - founded by Enea Buzzi with Achille Savinelli, and still run by the Buzzi family. Pura is not a model name. It is Brebbia's word for a block free of fills and visible imperfections, finished in carnauba wax alone: no putty, no dark stain hiding a flaw. What you see on this bowl is the wood, with nothing done to it but polish.

Then look at the silver.

Not one mount but two: a sterling band at the shank, hallmarked 925 and engraved AACHEN 1997, and a sterling cap around the rim - the ring that takes the char and keeps a smooth bowl looking new thirty years later. A silver star sits on the stem as the mark. Caps are what a shop specifies when the pipe is meant to last a lifetime, not a season.

It has never been smoked. No cake, no rim char under that silver, no tooth marks. Bare briar in the chamber.

A large bent billiard with a fat tapered acrylic stem, fishtail mouthpiece, and a 9mm filter - the German fitting this pipe was built around.

THE MARKS
- BREBBIA, MADE IN ITALY, PURA - maker, origin, and the flawless-briar grade
- Schneiderwind in script with W.O. SELECTION beneath - the Aachen house mark
- Sterling band: 925, engraved AACHEN 1997
- Sterling cap at the rim
- Silver star on the stem
- 9mm filter

THE MEASUREMENTS
Length 138mm (5.5") - bowl height 58mm (2.3") - bowl width 42mm (1.7") - chamber depth 40mm (1.6") - chamber diameter 20mm (0.8") - weight 2.7 oz

Finish and grain: see the photographs.

One year, a small number made, an Italian house at the top of its grade, and two pieces of sterling. Never lit.

Ships from the Faridunhill archive. Worldwide shipping.

SKU-18