Directory of Swedish Pipe Brands

Directory of Swedish Pipe Brands gathers, in alphabetical order, pipe names founded in Sweden, run by Swedish makers, or mentioned in the country's brand records. What survives on record draws a two-sided picture: on one side, individual masters working the benches of 18th-century clay pipe workshops, and on the other, series-production factory brands of the 20th century. Stockholm's Museum of Tobacco and Matches is the principal place where pieces from both ends can be seen together. The entries below summarize only documented facts; details with no basis in the sources are not included.

Brands

• Olaf Forsberg — A clay pipe master. Records show him taking his place at a Stockholm workshop bench in 1739; his name is counted among the recognized figures of 18th-century Swedish clay pipe making. His pieces are scattered across the collections of various specialist museums, with the largest number found at the capital's Museum of Tobacco and Matches (Tobaks & Tändsticksmuseum).

• Ratos — A series-production brand present in the Swedish market for more than forty years, known for a broad range of shapes. It is stated that only aged briar is used for the bowl material, and in some models the bowl interior is lined with meerschaum. According to information from 2009, every pipe in the series was filtered, and production took place at what was then still the oldest active pipe factory in France. Some Ratos pipes have been distributed by the Borkum Riff tobacco brand at pipe-smoking competitions.

• Skapi — The shortened name of Skandinaviska Pipfabriken, based in Uddevalla; it stands for both the factory and the brand under which its pipes reached the market. The factory's founding in 1936 was the work of Max D. Schwab, who came from a family engaged in pipe craft in Germany. Production covered classic shapes as well as system pipes; the business closed in the late 1960s.