Design by FRANZ

From Pipedia
Revision as of 14:04, 29 January 2008 by TseHa (talk | contribs)
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Matt 10.jpg

Grown up in Zurich, Franz von Matt by original profession was a self-employed Dipl. Architect (HTL). Therefore exact and precise working were trusted well to him. Apart from that, he trained, first as a hobby, his manual capabilities repairing and reconstructing historic metal and wooden wheels clocks. The passionate pipe smoker made another of his hobbies to his main occupation in 1998. In the romantic village Teufenthal (Argovia), beneath the medieval Trostburg castle, he opened in an old house in the Schlossgasse 22 a pipe workshop he named Pipe-Factory 22. The long-time and close friend, pipe artisan Bertram Safferling of Bad Cannstatt, certainly played an important role in this decision. At that time there were just four pipemakers in Switzerland - von Matt the sole full-time employed.

Made him famous in 1998: The Timeless
Matt idee2.jpg

Right at the beginning, the lateral entrant caused proper furor introducing the design pipe "Timeless". The Timeless with its spherical bowl stained in many unusual colors was an impudent conversion of the historic Swiss Appenzeller type. It made him famous over night, but unfortunately the newcomer later on was often reduced on this product by many critics, for design(er) pipes absolutely were not everyone’s favorite. To be sure, under his label design by FRANZ not only funky design pipes were created, he also developed classic forms discreetly further.

Otherwise, one could indeed name von Matt a "pipe architect", for he loved the exciting interaction between the constructive development of an innovative pipe design on the drawing board and it’s physical conversion at the lathe.

To be contuined!

Coq du Bruyere
Awarded in 2001: Schräge Vögel / Odd Birds