It's funny how some people get offended so easily. I am new to the forum and when I see people talking about pipes they seem to mention things like Costello or Dunhill and the artisans at the upper end and a lot of people on here are smoking cobs Rossis Savinellis Petersons etc. It seems that the upper ranges approach maybe hundreds of dollars but not thousands and not thirty five thousand lol.
I was just wondering if regular pipe smokers are buying these or is it investors or something I don't know about. Are the people buying these on this forum?
And I was wondering if they are here they could tell me what is it exactly makes a pipe worth 35,000 dollars or even 10,000 dollars. I am curious not judgemental. I know what makes a wine worth 1000s or a car or a rolex but pipes not sure.
While I don't own any pipes in the 5 digit range, I have known a couple of collectors who own pipes in this range, and being the curious type who throws etiquette out the window when it suits me, I've asked them about it.
And, there are a few things that become apparent. They saw a craftsman whose work and ethos impressed them as something above and beyond, something individual and admirable and they bought his work. They had the means, but they weren't spending any 5 figures for any of it, high 3's, low 4's.
But their buying and the buzz it created, grew the craftsman's market and prices for his work went up. Then death took its toll and that tends to put a cap on further production, resulting in a further rise in prices as collectors with money compete with each other to get an example for their collections.
None of the people I asked bought their pipes at top of the market, and none of them thought of their pipes as an "investment". Being financial professionals, pipes as an investment struck them as stupid thinking, even though they had to admit that they purchases were worth a lot more than they paid.
One of them pointed to the expanding Asian market as a factor in the rise of prices among a few carvers. In Asia the gift of a rare pipe by a celebrity carver could seal a lucrative business deal. So the reasons for these lofty prices became more varied and the forces behind them more complicated.
Priced a Da Vinci painting recently? A 5 figured price for a pipe doesn't seem quite as farfetched, and the prices of both are the product of forces that have little to do with the intrinsic value of either object.
I've asked one of the collectors if his Bo Nordhs really smoked that much better than all other pipes he's owned and his reply was, "They smoke about as well as my Grabows."
