Tag Archives: inner and outer edges

Restoring a Ferndown Bark L&JS Briars Silver Spigot Billiard

By Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is a beautiful rusticated Billiard with a silver ferrule and silver spigot stem. We purchased it from an Antique Mall in Lincoln City, Oregon, USA on 08/24/2024. The pipe is stamped on a smooth panel on the underside of the shank and reads Ferndown [arched over] Bark followed by L&JS Briars [over] Hand Made In [over] England. There was a thin cake in the bowl and the rim top and inner edge had been scraped and was faded. There was grime ground into the rusticated finish around the bowl and shank. There was also some fading on the right side of the bowl toward the front running down from the rim edge to about midbowl. It was faded as if by sun or perhaps whatever had stripped the rim top. The pipe was someone’s obvious favourite and was well care. The inner edge looked to be in good condition. The oxidized ferrule and spigot end on the stem are both Sterling Silver. The ferrule bears the stamp L&JS followed by 925 on the left side. There is an LJS logo stamped in gold on the left side of the taper stem. The stem is heavily oxidized and calcified. There appears to be some light tooth chatter on the top and underside of the stem ahead of the button. I took photos of the pipe earlier this morning before I started my clean up work. I have included them below. I took a photo of the rim top, bowl and the surfaces of the stem to give a sense of the condition of the pipe. The walls of the bowl had a thin cake with no lava on the rim edges or top. The stem is heavily oxidized, calcified and dirty. There are light tooth marks on both sides ahead of the button.I took a photo of the stamping on the smooth panel on the underside the heel and the shank. It is clear and readable and read as noted above. The silver ferrule and the left side of the taper both have clear stamping under the oxidation that reads as noted above.I took some photos of the fading on the front and the right side of the bowl extending half way down the rusticated surface. It is wash out and matches the washed out rim top on the bowl. I took a photo of the pipe with the stem removed. It is definitely dirty and the silver and the stem both are oxidized. To gather backgound on the brand I turned to Pipephil’s site to see what was included in the listing there (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-f1.html). I have included both the screen capture and also the side bar below the photo I have included.Artisan: Leslie (Les) Wood. He was the master silver smith at Alfred Dunhill Ltd. before starting L. & J.S. Briars. Pipes for the European market are stamped “L. Wood” while those for US are stamped “Ferndown”. Production: ~ 2000 pipes/year (Ferndown + L.Wood) See also Elwood

The first pipe pictured in the screen capture above is stamped similarly to mine. The pipe I had in hand did not have the stars on the heel so there was no size designation on the pipe. This is a large pipe. The Bark finish is a designation used for both sandblasted and rusticated. The stem on the pipe I am working on is also not Cumberland but rather black vulcanite with a silver spigot ending.

I turned to Pipedia next (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Ferndown). There is a great article there on the carver, the pipes and the workshop. It is worth the time to give it a read. I am quoting the section on the pipes below for the information included.

Due to the vagaries of international trademark law, he sold his earlier pipes as ”L.&J.S Briars”, “Ellwood”, “Les Wood” or “L. Wood”. Until recently, an average of 1500 – 2000 pipes a year were sold as “Ferndown” — named for the mansion he lives in — in the UK and US, but as “L. Wood” pipes in Germany…

…To many pipe smokers, Les Wood’s pipes embody the revival of great English pipe making initiated by Ashton in the early 1980s. The high-grade Italian and Spanish plateau he prefers is oil-cured in the tradition of both Dunhill and Ashton. The pipes are renowned for their pleasant, slightly nutty flavor and remarkable smoking characteristics. They feature impeccable craftsmanship extending to very good stem/bit work, though many pipes are often a bit heavier. The hallmark of his work, of course, is the excellent silver work. Almost all of his pipes feature rings or ferules for spigot stems. Grading is by finish: “Bark” (ca. 90%, rusticated, dark brown and black), “Antique Bark” (tan rusticated), “Reo” (brown and red, smooth), “Root” (orange, smooth), and “Tudor Root” (orange and brown smooth) and by size (one to four stars). He also designates straight grains with SG.

The pipe I am working on is as noted above a Ferndown which identifies it as a pipe named after his mansion and as a pipe made for the UK and the US. It is also as noted in red above stamped Bark which identifies it as a dark brown and black rusticated pipe.

Now it was time to work on the pipe. I started my work by reaming the pipe. I scraped out the light cake with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I took the cake back to bare briar. I sanded the walls smooth with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. The bowl walls looked very good with no burn damage or checking on the walls. I worked on the fading and damage to the rim top with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. It looked much better when I had finished with the last of the pads.At this point I stained the rim top and the faded areas around the bowl with a Mahogany stain pen. It blended well with the surrounding briar on the bowl sides. The rim top looked better but I would need to polish it and clean up the finished look of the rim top. I cleaned out he internals of the shank, mortise and airway in the shank and the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners.I polished the smooth rim top with micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded it with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads and wiped the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth. By the final pads the briar really had a shine. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the smooth rim top surface with my fingertips and into the heavy rustication with a shoebrush. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I buffed it with a cotton cloth to deepen the shine. The briar really comes alive with the balm. I polished the silver ferrule and the spigot end on the stem with a jeweller’s cloth to clean up and prevent further oxidation in the future. The contrast between the silver and the heavy rustication is very nice. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I scrubbed the oxidation on the stem surface with Soft Scrub and cotton pads until it was much cleaner.I sanded the surface with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with Obsidian Oil. I was able to remove the remnants of oxidation and the stem looked better.I touched up the LJS stamp on the left side of the taper stem with Rub’n Buff Antique Gold. I rubbed it on and worked it into the stamp with a tooth pick. I buffed it off with an Obsidian Oil cloth. It looks very good.I polished the vulcanite stem with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I used Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine to further polish the stem. This beautiful Ferndown Bark Rusticated L&JS Briars Silver Spigot Billiard with a taper vulcanite stem looks amazing after the work on it. The briar is clean and the grain really came alive. The rich brown stains gave the finish a sense of depth with the polishing and waxing. The grain really popped. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Ferndown Bark Silver Spigot Billiard really is a beauty and feels great in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 ¾ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 66 grams/2.33 ounces. This beautiful rusticated pipe will soon be on the rebornpipes store in the British Pipemakers Secton. It should make a great smoker for the next trustee. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. It was a fun one to work on.

Restoring a Danish Mystery Panel Plateau Freehand

1 Reply

Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is a Danish looking Plateau Panel. We purchased it from fellow in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, USA on 03/20/2024. He said that as far as he could tell it appeared to be unstamped. To me it looked like a Danish pipe but I could not identify it from the photos he sent me nor could he. There was a thick cake in the bowl with a heavy lava coat around the inner edge and deep in the valleys and crevices on the plateau top. There was grime ground into the rusticated finish around the bowl and shank. The plateau end on the shank end was also dirty. The pipe had been smoked heavily and was someone’s obvious favourite. It was hard to know the condition of the inner edge for certain because of the lava. The stamping on the shank is not visible in the photos and the seller could not read anything. The fancy turned saddle stem is oxidized and calcified. There appears to be some deep tooth marks and chatter on the top and underside of the stem ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up work. I have included them below.Jeff took photos of the rim top, bowl and the surfaces of the stem to give a sense of the condition of the pipe. The walls of the bowl had a thick cake which overflowed over the rim edges and onto the rim top. The stem is oxidized, calcified and dirty. There are tooth marks on both sides ahead of the button. He took photos of the sides and heel of the bowl to give a clear picture of the way the shape follows the grain. The grain is really beautiful even showing through the grime filling in the valleys and low spots. The plateau on the rim top and shank end is beautiful but dirty. He took photos of the stamping on the smooth underside of the shank. It is faint but is partial readable. This finally is a lead for the brand on the pipe that was a mystery until this moment. It looks like it says Holtorp [over] Denmark.I did some digging to see what I could learn about the holtorp brand. I turned first to Pipephil’s site (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-h3.html). There was a listing and a photo of the stamping on the stamping on the shank. It matches the one I am working on. I have also included the side bar information below the screen capture.Artisan: P. Holtorp was one of the regular pipe carver at Pipe-Dan in Copenhagen during the 1960’s. Rather massive (sometimes heavy) and well grained flawless pipes.

I turned to Pipedia and found more information that was helpful. It gave some history of the carver and the brand (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Holtorp). I have included it below.

H. Dan-Christensen’s shop Pipe-Dan at Vestergade 13 – just off Copenhagen’s Town Hall Square – was one of the most important turntables for upcoming as well as established pipemakers and pipe enthusiasts from all over the world from the 1960’s to the 1980’s.

P. Holtorp was one of the many artisanal carvers who worked in the periphery of Pipe-Dan. In the 1960’s – maybe up to the early 1970’s – he was one of the in-house pipemakers working together with Sven Knudsen, Gert Holbek, Axel Svend Celius, Tom Eltang – just to name a few. Later he worked from his own shop but still sold most of his pipes via Pipe-Dan.

Holtorp never became as famous as some of the names mentioned. Most probably, because the majority of his pipes was a bit different from the Danish “fancy freehands” and more striving for elegance. The typical Holtorp features bold lines and forms. Some are very manly pipes, so to say, rather made for stronger built pipesters. Accordingly the weight tended to be considerable – e.g. 118g the pipe shown below. Many were versions of earlier Holbek or Pipe-Dan designs. His “Bird” shape pipes for Pipe-Dan are clean simple shapes that have become Danish classics.

Holtorp’s craftsmanship and execution match very high standards. Straight grains from his hands are more than a rarity but the dense and flawless graining of his pipes is remarkable.

Estates by Holtorp don’t ask the prices of some other contemporaneous Danes by far – Thus an excellent buy for those who love a quality pipe if they can find them.

It also included a photo of the stamping and I can definitely confirm that my mystery on the brand is solved. The pipe is a Holtorp.

Now it was my turn to work on the pipe. Jeff had done an amazing cleanup of the pipe. He reamed the light cake with a PipNet reamer and cleaned up that with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the internals of the bowl and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the externals with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and rinsed the bowl off with running water. There were a couple of spots on the front panel of the bowl that looked like flaws and the briar was concave a bit around them. I would need to see what the cause was for that. He soaked the stem in Briarville’s Pipe stem Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and rubbed it down to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The pipe looked very good when I received it. I took photos of the bowl and the rim top as well as both sides of the stem to show the condition of the pipe before I started my work. The rim top was very clean and the inner edge and plateau top look much better. The stem showed tooth marks on the top and underside of the stem near the button. I took the stem off the bowl and took a photo of the parts. It is an interesting pipe. I sanded the inside of the bowl to smooth out the walls with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a dowel. I was able to remove smooth the residual carbon on the front inner wall of the bowl. There was one small pit mid bowl in the wall at the front that I would need to fill in and repair.I sanded off the stain on the high points on the plateau with 220 grit sandpaper so there would be some contrast between the dark stain in the valleys and matching stain on the high points that is like the rest of the exterior. I did the same on the plateau shank end. It looks very good. I finished working over the plateau with a brass bristle wire brush to further clean it up. There was a divot or dent on the front of the bowl mid-bowl with two small flaws in it. I filled it in with clear CA glue. Once it cured I used the topping board and 220 grit sandpaper to flatten the repair and start the process of blending it into the surface. I further smoothed it out with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. It was looking much better. I sanded the entire bowl with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down with a damp cloth between each sanding pad. It really began to take on a shine. I heated the briar and stained it with a Cordovan stain. I fired it with a lighter to set the stain and burn off the alcohol. I repeated the process until I was happy with the coverage on the pipe. I wiped the bowl down with isopropyl alcohol on cotton pads to remove the excess stain on the briar. It began to look very good. I sanded the bowl with 600-3500 grit sanding pads to even out the stain and smooth the surface of the briar. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the plateau rim top surface with my fingertips and a shoebrush. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I buffed it with a cotton cloth to deepen the shine. The briar really comes alive with the balm. I repaired the damaged area on the inside of the bowl with a thin coating of JB Weld. I applied it in the bowl with a pipe cleaner and pushed it into the area with a tooth pick. Once it cured I sanded it smooth with sandpaper wrapped around a dowel leaving only the burned area with the repair. It looked much better and was very smooth. I mixed a batch of bowl coating made of sour cream and activated charcoal powder. I used a pipe cleaner to stir it up and also to apply it to the bowl walls. I wanted to give a coat to protect it until a new cake could be formed. It also covered the repair with the JB Weld and protected it. I set the bowl aside for the bowl coating to cure and turned my attention to the stem. I “painted” it with the flame of a lighter to lift the tooth marks. I was able to lift the majority of them. What remained I filled in with clear CA glue and set it aside to cure. I used a small file to flatten out the repair on the stem and recut the sharp edge of the stem. I sanded out the roughness and smoothed out repaired tooth damage with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with Obsidian Oil. I was able to remove the roughness and damage and the stem looked better.I polished the vulcanite stem with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I used Before & After Pipe Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine to further polish the stem. This nice looking Holtorp Panel Plateau with a taper vulcanite stem is a great looking pipe now that it has been restored. The briar is clean and the grain really came alive. The rich brown stains gave the finish a sense of depth with the polishing and waxing. The grain really popped. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Holtrop Panel Plateau really is a beauty and feels great in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 2 inches x 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: 1 inch. The weight of the pipe is 62 grams/ 2.19 ounces. This beautiful Freehand pipe will soon be on the rebornpipes store in the Danish Pipemakers Secton. It should make a great smoker for the next trustee. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. It was a fun one to work on.

Restoring a Ferndown Bark Antique *** Hand Made in England Les Wood Dublin

Restoring a Lightly Smoked Joe Case 2013 Hand Made Poker

Restoring a Beautiful Rusticated Ferndown Bark 2 Star Lovat

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I have chosen to work on is a nice looking rusticated Ferndown Lovat that I picked up in a lot of 10 pipes from a fellow on Vancouver Island who was selling his collection. The stamping on the underside of the shank and reads Ferndown [arched over] 2 *s and Bark. That is followed by Hand Made In [over] England [over] Les Wood. The silver band on the shank is stamped L&JS in a rectangle [over] 925. The vulcanite saddle stem is stamped LJS in gold on the left side of the saddle. The pipe came in a no name pipe sock. I took the pipe out of the sock and turned it over in my hands. It was in pretty good condition. This is what I saw

The finish was dusty and dirty in the grooves and valleys of the shallow, tight rusticated finish. Otherwise the finish looked very good.
The smooth rim top showed some darkening and scratches in the finish. There was some light lava build on the rim top and the inner and outer edges of the bowl were clean and undamaged.
There was a light cake in the bowl. It held the aroma of the tobaccos smoked in it but fortunately they were not aromatic. The walls looked to be undamaged but once I reamed it I would know more about that.
The vulcanite saddle stem had the LJS Logo on the left side in gold. The vulcanite stem is lightly oxidized on the left side but otherwise clean. There are light tooth chatter and marks on both sides but nothing deep.

To summarize what I saw – this Ferndown is a well made pipe as to be expected. It is dusty but otherwise in good condition. The vulcanite stem is lightly marked but otherwise undamaged. The look and feel of the pipe is great in the hand and the rustication is shallow but very beautiful. It is going to clean up very well. Here are photos of the pipe before I started my clean up. What do you see when you examine it? The bowl of the pipe looked very good. The rim top is clean other than a light lava build up and some scratching. The edges of the bowl were undamaged and looked very good. I see no warning signs in the rim top or the edges of the bowl. I took photos of the acrylic stem to show its condition. Though hard to see there are light tooth marks and chatter on the surface of both sides ahead of the button but it should clean up easily with sandpaper. The next photo captures the stamping on the underside of the shank. They read as I have noted above. The second photo shows the stamp on the silver band and on the left side of the saddle stem. It is also clear and readable. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo to capture the economy of this nice pipe.It has been awhile since I had cleaned up a Les Wood pipe and in this case a Ferndown rusticated Lovat stamp that left me with some questions that I need to answer before I began to work on the pipe. I turned first to the Pipephil site to help me interpret the stamping on the pipe and gain some background information on the brand and line (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-f1.html). The photo to the left shows Les Wood and the information below came from the side bar. I have also done a screen capture of the information on the site.

Artisan: Leslie (Les) Wood. He was the master silver smith at Alfred Dunhill Ltd. before starting L. & J.S. Briars. Pipes for the European market are stamped “L. Wood” while those for US are stamped “Ferndown”. Production: ~ 2000 pipes/year (Ferndown + L.Wood) See also Elwood.From the information on Pipephil I learned that I was working on a pipe made for the US and that it was a large 2 star pipe in terms of size. I also learned that the Bark finish was a sandblasted or rusticated. The one I had in hand was a tightly rusticated finish with a smooth strip on the underside of the shank for the stamping. All of which helped to understand the pipe I was going to work on.

I turned to Pipedia (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Ferndown) to find a more detailed history and description of the brand and was amazed to find that the majority of it was either quotes or written by Les Wood himself. I am quoting some pertinent parts of the article below. You can turn to the site to read it in full.

Leslie “Les” John Wood worked for Dunhill for 19 years. His last position was as master silversmith. Following his tenure with Dunhill, Les formed his own brand, L. & J.S. Briars together with his wife Dolly in 1978. Les Wood follows Sasieni, the first ex Dunhill worker to start their own enterprise, and he was followed by William John “Ashton”-Taylor.

“I started working at Dunhill’s in March 1963, in the silver mounting department working under Jack Spriggs he left the firm after I had been there for 2 years, and I took over the department, at that time I worked alone it was only when the department was relocated to the top floor that the increase of pipes that needed mounting that we took on trainees. After 19 years I was asked if I would buy the machinery and move out of the factory and set up on my own, so off I went. With me I took the staff that worked with me at that time, Robert Morris was the best, he could mount anything, he now has his own jewellery retail shop and makes some really nice handmade jewellery from his shop at Whitstable in Kent.”

“I worked on Dunhill’s pipes from 1980/81 and soon built up a reputation as the firm to send your mounting to. As time went on and Dolly left Dunhill’s we decided to start to turn our own bowls and make our own pipes under the name of my house.” Les Wood. Jan, 2020…”

Due to the vagaries of international trademark law, he sold his earlier pipes as ” L.&J.S Briars”, “Ellwood”, “Les Wood” or “L. Wood”. Until recently, an average of 1500 – 2000 pipes a year were sold as “Ferndown” — named for the mansion he lives in — in the UK and US, but as “L. Wood” pipes in Germany…

To many pipe smokers, Les Wood’s pipes embody the revival of great English pipe making initiated by Ashton in the early 1980s. The high-grade Italian and Spanish plateau he prefers is oil-cured in the tradition of both Dunhill and Ashton. The pipes are renowned for their pleasant, slightly nutty flavor and remarkable smoking characteristics. They feature impeccable craftsmanship extending to very good stem/bit work, though many pipes are often a bit heavier. The hallmark of his work, of course, is the excellent silver work. Almost all of his pipes feature rings or ferules for spigot stems. Grading is by finish: “Bark” (ca. 90%, rusticated, dark brown and black), “Antique Bark” (tan rusticated), “Reo” (brown and red, smooth), “Root” (orange, smooth), and “Tudor Root” (orange and brown smooth) and by size (one to four stars). He also designates straight grains with SG…

“We bought the briar from Italy and Spain, one is mush denser that the other I like the Spanish briar it is lighter and Dolly would make the Roots look like glass with only a natural vanish, all the pipes were finished with the same varnish, the bark finish on the bowl is put on by Dolly by hand, one slip and you have a problem. That’s one job that needs to be seen to see how it’s done.”

There also was a great paragraph on the oil curing process that Les and Dolly developed. I am including that below as the pipe I am working on was definitely oil cured.

“We had our method of Oil-Curing. We applied Oil to the outside and the inside of the bowl, that was because when Dolly was at Dunhill’s factory, she worked in the finishing department and got such a high finish on the pipes they wanted to know how she did it. The bowls had already gone through Dunhills’ oven oil curing system, but to her, it was not enough, because it could not get the shine that she wanted, then, she oiled the bowl on the outside and the inside to get a better finished. She left Dunhill and came to work with me. Because of this process, we found out the smokers liked the taste when light up their pipe – they said there was no aftertaste and it had a sweet taste doesn’t matter what tobacco they used. We have carried it on from there.”

Armed with that information and renewing my knowledge of the brand it was time to work on the pipe. I started my work on the pipe by cleaning the internals. The cake was quite thin but it can hold residual oils from previous tobaccos and I wanted to check the bowl walls for burn damage or checking. I reamed it with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe knife and took the cake back to bare briar. I sanded the walls with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. I worked on them until they were smooth. There was no checking or burn damage to the bowl walls. It was quite clean.I cleaned out the internals of the shank and the airway in the stem with 99% isopropyl alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. I worked them over until they were clean. I scrubbed the externals of the bowl and shank with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I worked the soap into the grooves and valleys in the finish. I rinsed it off with warm running water. I dried it with a soft cotton towel. The bowl looks much better at this point in the process of recovery. I polished the smooth rim top with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the briar down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. The rim top began to take on a rich shine. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the rusticated finish on the bowl and shank and the smooth rim top. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect the wood. I used a horse hair shoe brush to work it into the crevices and keep from building up in the valleys and crevices of the finish. Once the bowl was covered with the balm I let it sit for about 15 minutes and buffed it off with a soft cotton cloth and the shoe brush. I polished it with a microfiber cloth. I took photos of the pipe at this point in the process to show what the bowl looked like at this point. I polished the silver band with a jewelers cloth. It is impregnated with an anti-tarnishing compound and polish. I rubbed the shank end band down with the cloth to polish and protect the band. It came out with a rich glow and shine. I set the bowl aside and worked on the stem. I sanded out the chatter and tooth marks with 220 grit sandpaper. I was able to remove the marks from the surface very well, leaving behind no sign of the tooth damage. I started polishing the stem surface with 600 grit wet dry sandpaper. I dry sanded both sides of the stem with 1500-12000 grit pads to polish it further. I wiped it down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. The shine grew deeper with each sanding pad. I finished polishing the stem with Before & After Pipe Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine polishes. I wiped the stem down with a damp cotton pad afterwards and buffed it with a soft microfiber cloth. I put the bowl and stem back together. I don’t buff the rusticated bowl on the wheel as it leaves a lot of grit in the deep grooves of the rustication. I gave the bowl and shank multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and buffed it with a shoe brush to raise the shine. The wax is great protection and I love using it on rusticated and sandblast finishes because it does not build up in the grooves and valleys like carnauba wax does. I buffed it by hand with a microfiber cloth to finish the shine. I polished the stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel to polish out the scratches in the vulcanite. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The contrast of the blacks, dark browns and reds of the stain on the briar with the shine of the polished vulcanite stem is quite stunning. The dark and shallow rustication around the bowl and shank is quite remarkable and gives the pipe an incredible tactile presence. The smooth rim top is a great addition. This is truly a beautiful pipe and one that will be a great smoking pipe. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: 3/4 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is a light and comfortable 56 grams/1.94 ounces. This is the first Ferndown Bark in my collection and I have been hunting for one for a while. This is a little larger than I was hoping for but it is a great looking pipe. I will be putting it on the holding onto it for awhile and enjoying it. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me. Cheers.

This restoration is a bit of a resurrection of a beautiful Ferndown Root 3* Dublin

3 Replies

Blog by Steve Laug

This pipe was one of those happy coincidences. I have been looking for a Les Wood Hand Made Ferndown pipe for quite a while now to add to my collection. I have read a lot about them and had them on the wish list but have never found one. The crazy thing was that I was looking on Maxim Engels Site here in Canada and on EBay when I received an email from David asking if I would be willing to breath life back into this badly damaged beauty. That should have been an easy answer but I have been turning down work as my “day” job has dramatically become more consuming and I am left without a lot of time to work on pipes. I have been turning down pipes for repair for awhile now not wanting to add to the load. I postponed answering him and when I finally did I asked him to send me photos of the pipe so I would know what I was getting into. He immediately forwarded me the next two photos and I was hooked! I have not worked on a Ferndown before and this one looked like a good candidate for me to work on. I wrote and asked him about his timeline and he was very gracious with me. We struck a deal and the pipe was on its way to Canada for work. It dawned on me then that I had no idea what the rest of the pipe looked like and I would just have to wait and be surprised.I came home from my office yesterday to find the box from David waiting for me. My wife Irene had put it where I would see it. I took it to my work desk in the basement and carefully opened a well packed box that had originally contained pipes that I had sent to David. It was good to see this little box continue to serve its purpose as the vessel that protects it precious cargo. I took it out of the box and took some photos of it to chronicle the issues that I saw and give a benchmark for me before I began the work.

The pipe is a beautifully shape Dublin with a gold band. The pipe is stamped on the underside of the bowl and shank. On the heel of the bowl it is stamped Ferndown [arched over] Root [over] ***. Next to that it is stamped Hand Made In [over] England [over] Les Wood. On the gold band it is stamped L&JS in a rectangle [over] 9CT. The finish is quite beautiful but dirty on the bowl sides and shank. The largest issue with the pipe is the rim top and edges. There are burn marks around the front and back outer edges. The rim top itself is covered with lava but not enough to hide the charred inner edge and top. The damage is deep from the looks of the bowl top but cleaning would tell the story. The bowl itself is out of round from the damage. There was a thick cake in the bowl and the pipe stank of old tobacco but not enough to distinguish what it was… I know it was not an aromatic from the smell but otherwise I could not identify it. The taper stem is oxidized and has some calcification on the end. It is stamped on the left side and reads LJS. It was originally a stunning pipe and even with the damage and grime it still had class that was evident the moment you looked at it. I took a photo of the rim top and edges to show the burn damage around the bowl top and inner and outer edges. It has some serious char under the lava coat. The bowl is thickly caked as you can see from the photo. I also took photos of the stem to show its condition. There are light tooth marks and chatter on both sides next to the button and there is a deep oxidation in the vulcanite.I took a photo of the stamping on the heel of the bowl and underside of the shank and gold band. It is clear and readable as noted above.I removed the stem from the bowl and took a photo of the pipe to show the proportions of the design. It is really a well made pipe.I turned to Pipephil to help me interpret the stamping on the pipe and gain some background information (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-f1.html). The photo to the left shows Les Wood and the information below came from the side bar. I have also done a screen capture of the information on the site.

Artisan: Leslie (Les) Wood. He was the master silver smith at Alfred Dunhill Ltd. before starting L. & J.S. Briars. Pipes for the European market are stamped “L. Wood” while those for US are stamped “Ferndown”. Production: ~ 2000 pipes/year (Ferndown + L.Wood) See also Elwood.From the information on Pipephil I learned that I was working on a pipe made for the US and that it was a large 3 star pipe in terms of size. I also learned that the Root finish was a smooth light brown. All of which helped to understand the pipe in hand.

To many pipe smokers, Les Wood’s pipes embody the revival of great English pipe making initiated by Ashton in the early 1980s. The high-grade Italian and Spanish plateau he prefers is oil-cured in the tradition of both Dunhill and Ashton. The pipes are renowned for their pleasant, slightly nutty flavor and remarkable smoking characteristics. They feature impeccable craftsmanship extending to very good stem/bit work, though many pipes are often a bit heavier. The hallmark of his work, of course, is the excellent silver work. Almost all of his pipes feature rings or ferules for spigot stems. Grading is by finish: “Bark” (ca. 90%, rusticated, dark brown and black), “Antique Bark” (tan rusticated), “Reo” (brown and red, smooth), “Root” (orange, smooth), and “Tudor Root” (orange and brown smooth) and by size (one to four stars). He also designates straight grains with SG…

There also was a great paragraph on the oil curing process that Les and Dolly developed. I am including that below as the pipe I am working on was definitely oil cured.

With that background information it was now time to work on the pipe itself. I decided to top the bowl to remove the heavy charring damage. I put a piece of 180 grit sandpaper on the topping board and worked the rim top and edges over in a circular motion on the board. After a few passes I took a photo of the rim top to show the progress but also to show the burn damage.Before working on the rim edges I reamed the bowl with a PipNet Reamer to cut back the cake to bare wood. I cleaned up the remaining cake with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I then sanded the bowl with a piece of 220 sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel to smooth out the bowl walls. The reaming and sanding cleaned up a lot of the damage on the inner edge as you can see in the fourth photo below.With that done I turned my attention to the inner and outer edges of the rim. I cleaned up both with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I worked on removing the burn marks on the outer edge and gave the inner edge a light bevel to hide the burn marks.I scrubbed the exterior of the bowl and shank with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I work on the grime ground into the briar. I rinsed the bowl with warm running water to remove the debris left behind from the scrubbing. The pipe looked much better and the rim top was greatly improved. I cleaned the internals of the bowl, shank and airway in the stem with isopropyl alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners until they came out clean.I set the stem aside and turned my attention to polishing the briar. I used 1500-12000 grit micromesh sanding pads and wiped the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth. The briar on the rim began to change the colour to get much closer to the rest of the bowl. I used a Maple stain pen to blend the rim top into the colour of the rest of the bowl. It matched well and served to obscure the burn mark on the rim edges. I also restained a light spot on the heel of the bowl. I rubbed the bowl and shank down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the bowl sides and shank with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I let the balm sit for a little while and then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. The Balm did its magic and the grain stood out. I set the bowl aside and put the stem to soak in a bath of Briarville’s Pipe Stem Deoxidizer overnight. In the morning I rinsed it off with warm water and rubbed off the remaining softened oxidation until the stem was very clean. It looked very good and even the LJS gold stamping looked good. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I “painted” the tooth marks on the stem with the flame of a lighter to raise them. I sanded the remaining tooth chatter and marks with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the stem surface. I started the polishing process with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. I polished the vulcanite stem with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I used Before & After Pipe Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine to further polish the stem. The photo below shows the polished stem. I touched up the LJS stamp on the left side of the taper stem with Rub’n Buff Antique Gold. I rubbed it on and worked it into the stamp with a tooth pick. I buffed it off with a soft cloth. This nice looking Les Wood Ferndown Root 3 Dublin with a taper vulcanite stem is a great looking pipe now that it has been restored. The briar is clean and the grain really came alive. The rich brown stains gave the finish a sense of depth with the polishing and waxing. The grain really popped. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Ferndown Root 3 Dublin really is a beauty and feels great in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 66 grams/2.36 oz. The pipe will be going back David very soon. I am looking forward to what he thinks once he has it back in his hands. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. It was a fun one to work on.