I finished up Bilbo's Gift last night. I have worked on it off and on over the last year. But with my new shop set up the inspiration just took off this week. It is number 10 for me and it is the first one that I have made solely for myself. It is Morta with a Sterling silver ring and mother of pearl lucite stem. The idea for this pipe came from The Lord of the Rings. Normally churchwardens are imagined because of Gandalf, but my inspiration comes from Bilbo. Towards the end of the book Bilbo gives two pipes to Merry and Pippin. They were made by the elves and they had pearl mouthpieces. I chose morta and silver with the pearl, because the livery of Gondor is black and silver. This was a pipe of firsts for me. I had never used an accent before, never set a delrin tenon in a Rod blank before, and never used morta before. The Morta block and pearl rod blank came from Steve Norse of Vermont Freehand. I had our own Cosmicfolklore make me the silver piece for the shank. I shaped the pipe by hand and also drilled it freehand Danish style. I've tried to do the method where you glue little pieces of wood to the pipe and use the pin to guide it, but I find that just holding it in my hand works just as well especially with my new lathe. Here are some pics of the pipe and me smoking the first bowl which was Escudo aged 12 years. It smoked wonderfully and I couldn't be more pleased!
