Askwith Pipes

Askwith Pipes is a handmade pipe workshop run single-handedly by Chris Askwith in Plymouth, in southwest England. Producing since 2007, the brand is counted among the examples of the solo-maker workshops that regained strength in Britain in the late 2000s.

Shape Language

Askwith takes a flexible stance toward the shape tradition that dominates British pipemaking. Familiar patterns from the island school, such as the Billiard or the Bulldog, appear in the designs, but bowl height, shank thickness, and finish are usually shifted in measured ways. This approach is considered closer to the free interpretation of contemporary American makers than to English workshops. Sandblast and smooth polish are used in roughly equal measure across production.

The color choices on the mouthpieces are the brand's most quickly recognized trait. By the maker's own account, the vivid, even bold polyester colors were not a planned choice from the outset but the result of a broad color swatch that came into his hands as samples; over time it became the brand's signature.

From Silversmithing to the Pipe Bench

Askwith's first trade was silversmithing. By his own account, he took up pipe smoking in 2006, then moved into cleaning and restoring secondhand pipes, finding that the tools he had acquired for jewelry-making suited this work as well. Records indicate that his move from restoration to production came through attending South West Pipe Club meetings in 2007, where he met the Cornwall-based American maker Paul Hubartt. By his account, the first ten or so Askwith pipes were made at Hubartt's bench, on his machines, and the proceeds from their sale were spent on equipping his own workshop. The technical exchange with Hubartt's brand, Larrysson Pipes, continued in later years as well. The source of these details is the maker's own testimony; they are not backed by an independent document.

Materials and Construction

Alongside briar, the second body material worked regularly in the workshop is bog oak — oak that has spent thousands of years in a bog and become semi-fossilized. Askwith is presented as one of the few English makers who uses this material consistently rather than occasionally. According to the maker's own statements, bodies are also cut from strawberry wood and olive wood, and the smoke channel is bored to a 4-millimeter diameter; neither claim has been confirmed by an independent source.

Mouthpieces are hand-cut from polyester, lucite, ebonite, cumberland, and horn. The bore is kept generous and flattens out wider at the bite zone. The transition between body and mouthpiece is mostly built on a delrin tenon, a solution favored in contemporary workshops because it does not stress the briar during disassembly and reassembly. The thin decorative bands on the mouthpiece use exotic woods and various metals.

Pipes are stamped with the maker's surname. Again by the maker's account, a silver Askwith logo is inlaid into the mouthpiece — a detail that ties the brand directly back to its roots in silversmithing.