**DISCONTINUED** Charlotte Bronte Figurine Handmade English Clay Pipe

Sadly the clay pipes are no longer made in the famous Sharrow Mills factory in sheffield. Once made in batches of thousands at a time it seems that clay pipes will soon be a thing of the past.

• Overall Length: 125mm
• Bowl Height: 48mm
• Bowl Diameter: 26mm
• Bore: 16mm
• Weight: 27g
• Presentation Boxed

English Clay Pipes: Clay pipes were the original everyday pipe introduced to England in the 16th century and in the hey day of the clay millions were being made in every town across England. In the 1700's it became popular to add faces, animals and various other designs to clay pipes to appeal to the consumer leading to many thousands of unique designs. They were cheap to make but fragile so once broken they were simply discarded. You won't have to dig far to find one in your garden!

Wilsons of Sharrow Clay Pipes: The Charlotte Bronte Clay Pipe is hand made by Wilsons of Sharrow in the heart of Sheffield using original moulds, patterns and skills learnt over the generations. Every pipe will have it's own casting imperfections meaning each pipe has it's own unique character.

Smoking a clay pipe: We probably sell a good 70% of clay pipes for collections or novelty. The clay pipe was designed for smoking and many people still enjoy smoking them. They were smoked for many centuries but do not compare to the smoke of a real Briar. They are porous, which helps them smoke a little cooler and absorb some impurities but there is no filter of any description so the smoke is straight through and can smoke quite harsh if you are used to a Briar pipe. If you do manage to smoke one for a while without breaking it you should be able to build up some beautiful colourations in the clay as the tobacco and heat will transform the colour of the pipe. We would recommend using some Philtpad filters with a clay pipe if you are planning on smoking it. The untreated clay on the stem of the pipe will stick to the lips with moisture so we recommend dipping in butter prior to use.

Fragile: Clay pipes are naturally very fragile and will break with minimal miss-handling. There is no guarantee on a clay pipe for this reason. It is likely there will be faults and air bubbles in the clay formed as it is moulded so do not expect a perfect well finished pipe. This is part of the character and appeal of a clay.