M
mothernaturewilleatusallforbreakfast
Guest
Let me preface this by stating that I don't own or buy many handmade artisan pipes, but do own and occasionally buy from those who make classically shaped pipes well. I want to share a story about Michail Kyriazanos. I own three of Michail's pipes; a billiard, a canadian, and a bulldog. I purchased the billiard and bulldog new and the canadian as an estate. I knowingly bought the canadian with a stem that was described as having some stubborn oxidation that would not come off. The oxidation was really only noticeable in good light, but the pipe tasted funny when I smoked it. I cleaned the pipe a number of times, tried smoking only Carter Hall in it to see if the strange flavor would fade; but after many attempts to get the weird flavor of the pipe to correct itself I gave up.
I was going to resell the pipe, but thought how much of an injustice it would be to just recycle the pipe through the community and instead chose to contact Michail about the issue. We discussed the issue and after deciphering that it was most likely the stem, he asked me to send it to him in Greece so that he could make a new stem for it. The only way I knew that it was the stem and not the briar was because I had previously bought a pipe made by a new and upcoming pipe carver about 4 years ago that had been made from a piece of briar that had not been cured properly. I knew that uncured briar flavor from that experience and quickly started to determine that the canadian had more of a weird rubbery flavor than that uncured briar flavor that I had remembered. So I sent the pipe.
Fast forward to the Chicago show this past April. I met Michail at the show and picked up the pipe from him in person. He replaced the oddly oxidized black vulcanite stem with a brand new cumberland vulcanite stem. The new stem was better than the old one in terms of aesthetic and of course that it didn't affect the way the pipe tasted.
I just wanted to publicly thank Michail for his generosity, as he refused to accept any type of compensation for the materials and time spent making that new stem. I also want to encourage those who find issue with a handmade pipe to consider contacting the maker of the pipe (if possible) before just sending it off into the world of recycled estate pipes. You may be surprised to find that the issue is correctable and that the pipe can live up to it's true potential.
I was going to resell the pipe, but thought how much of an injustice it would be to just recycle the pipe through the community and instead chose to contact Michail about the issue. We discussed the issue and after deciphering that it was most likely the stem, he asked me to send it to him in Greece so that he could make a new stem for it. The only way I knew that it was the stem and not the briar was because I had previously bought a pipe made by a new and upcoming pipe carver about 4 years ago that had been made from a piece of briar that had not been cured properly. I knew that uncured briar flavor from that experience and quickly started to determine that the canadian had more of a weird rubbery flavor than that uncured briar flavor that I had remembered. So I sent the pipe.
Fast forward to the Chicago show this past April. I met Michail at the show and picked up the pipe from him in person. He replaced the oddly oxidized black vulcanite stem with a brand new cumberland vulcanite stem. The new stem was better than the old one in terms of aesthetic and of course that it didn't affect the way the pipe tasted.
I just wanted to publicly thank Michail for his generosity, as he refused to accept any type of compensation for the materials and time spent making that new stem. I also want to encourage those who find issue with a handmade pipe to consider contacting the maker of the pipe (if possible) before just sending it off into the world of recycled estate pipes. You may be surprised to find that the issue is correctable and that the pipe can live up to it's true potential.
