Maigurs Knets

Maigurs Knets is a pipemaker born in Latvia who has worked in the United States since 1990. The workshop bearing his name is built on individually finished pieces rather than mass production, and is known for its attempt to carry the flowing line of Art Nouveau into pipe shape. The maker works in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.

From Latvia to Wisconsin

Knets was born in Latvia in 1962. He completed his art education in applied decorative arts, graduating in 1989; records indicate the school was in Liepāja, and his diploma covered antique furniture restoration, wood carving, and sculpture. He emigrated to the United States in 1990 and settled around Chicago.

The roughly twenty years that followed passed as something of an indirect extension of his art training: throughout this period Knets produced models and prototypes for the hobby, toy, and industrial design sectors. The habits of precise measurement, mold logic, and hand-shaping carried over from that work and later transferred directly to the pipe lathe. He moved into full-time pipemaking in 2010.

Approach to Shape and Technique

Knets's work is set apart by his treatment of the briar block not as a body but as a block of sculpture. Surfaces suggesting a leaf, shell, or wave are worked into the outside of the bowl; most of this is carved not by lathe and sanding disc but with sharp carbide burrs. This method allows for finer detail than classic turning could achieve, but it requires each piece to proceed slowly, one at a time.

Two extremes coexist in his repertoire. On one side stand the sculptural pieces, tied to the freehand tradition, that made the maker's name; on the other, clean readings of classic molds such as the acorn and billiard. Smooth finishes and sandblasting often meet on the same pipe: a polished leaf or relief is set off against a sandblasted texture. Ebonite is standard on the stem side; the maker also shapes the tenon himself as a hand-formed piece. Examples are known in which accents such as horn, composite fill, and cross-sections of wood are used decoratively.

Stamp and Grading

Pipes are generally stamped "M Knets" and "USA," accompanied by a piece number. On smooth-finished examples, two separate rows of two or three stars appear above and below the name: according to compiled information, one of these rows indicates the maker's own rating of the piece, the other the grain quality. He is also said to stamp a cicada mark on pieces he considers exceptional, with a double cicada corresponding to the top tier. The system rests on the standard of a single one-person artisan workshop and is not tied to a standard comparable with factory grading.

According to reports, a Knets pipe was among seven pieces selected in a 2013 American pipemakers' competition held by the Greater Kansas City Pipe Club. As a one-person workshop, his annual output is limited.