Geiger Pipes

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Love's Website "Geiger Pipes"


Pearls - Pipes by Jan Andersson (Written Sept. 2003)

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Do you know how old a Freshwater Pearl Mussel may be? Much older than we human beings, 250 years - and about one mussel in a thousand carries a pearl. It is nowadays only to be found in six small rivers in Sweden and one of them is called Vram River. That this mussel is still living healthy there we have to thank the chips-manufacturer OLW for. You may think I am joking, but that is a fact. So I have a suggestion to all consumers of chips: buy OLW next time, and a few cents from each bag will help to keep this small river healthy. And in that way you can eat the unhealthy chips with a good conscience, and that is a good thing, no? The main purpose for OLW is that the freshwater mussel shall survive, but the Vram River also has other assets; there are a lot of salmons and crayfish in that river.

All that I was told one of the first really hot days in July when I was visiting Årröd, a place in the middle of Scania with a great natural beauty. My purpose with this visit was not to learn as much as possible about this river (that was an extra plus), and even if I was looking for a circus-wagon, I did not intend to go to a circus performance. No, I was looking for that circus-wagon for another reason, and without too much trouble I found it on a meadow, not far from the earlier mentioned Vram River. On the outside the wagon looked rather shabby, but when I entered I found a comfortable and well equipped workshop. This is the working-place for the young Swedish pipe-maker Love Geiger.


Pipes in soapstone

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Love Geiger made his first pipe in the middle of the last decade, but the material was not briar but soapstone. Love had just started smoking a pipe and for a young man with an interest in making things with his own hands, it was natural to try making a pipe for himself. The material at hand was pipestone. He made a few pipes for his own use and also some for his friends, but the pipes were not very good, they became extremely hot and were very fragile.

A few years later Love got a lot of vulcanite stems and a few blocks of briar from a friend. Love got excited and decided not to make any more pipes from soapstone. He looked for information about pipe-making on the internet and got in touch with the American pipe-maker Trever Talbert. This was the start of an extensive correspondence over the Atlantic Ocean. Love had a lot of questions and Trever Talbert was willingly sharing his experiences and knowledge with Love. In that way Love learned a lot and, as he says himself, he also learnt very much from all mistakes he made in the beginning.

I met Love for the first time about two years ago. He had just started making briar-pipes and one evening he paid me a visit and showed his first pipes. But since that visit much has happened.


A circus-wagon as a workshop

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Love Geiger is living in a collective called “Moder Jord” (Mother Earth), started in the 70’s by his father (the gentleman who told me about the fresh water mussel). Here lives the entire Geiger family but also a lot of other people, more in the summer than in the winter period. As mentioned before the place is of great natural beauty and from what I understand, the people here are living in close connection to nature. They have a hydroelectric power station, a mill of their own, a lot of the wood used for heating is taken from their own property and they cultivate a lot of vegetables. As Love is very inspired by nature in designing his pipes, it is hard to imagine a more suitable surrounding for him to live and work in.

Last summer Love bought an old circus-wagon which he decided to fit up as a work-shop. He really has succeeded in this, it is spacious, all the necessary machinery and tools are there and it is indeed a very pleasant place. However he is not completely ready, there is one more room fit up and he is also planning to repair and paint the exterior of the wagon. It will certainly become a beauty even outside in due time. It is a pity that there is so little interest in pipes among common people these days, otherwise Love could have travelled around with his wagon to fairs and expos, selling his pipes and showing people how they were made.

During the fitting-up of his workshop, Love has several times been in contact with another Swedish pipemaker, Bengt Carlson, who has helped him to find suitable equipment, mainly the most costly thing, the lathe. And a lathe bought from a hardware store is not ready to be used for pipe-making. Some things must be changed and some complementary equipment must be made. Bengt has the right connections to have this done properly. I hope and believe that the connection between Bengt and Love will continue in the future.


Pipes treated with – alcohol

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Today Love has about 70 blocks of briar of the highest quality in his workshop. All of these are from Corsica and stored for at least 3 years. But Love is not addicted to Corsican briar, he is willing to buy briar from any place around the Mediterranean Sea where he can find the best quality. Today I think this is a common view among pipe-makers - you buy the briar where the best quality is to be found. The earlier fixation to Corsican briar has disappeared. However, Love says that he wants to find older blocks and for the future, he wants all blocks to be at least 5 years old before he makes pipes of them.

So far, Love has mostly used vulcanite for his stems, but he also has a large supply of acrylic in different colours, which is used when he finds it suitable.

Most of Love’s pipes are in natural finish but they are treated in a rather special way. The pipe is put in 96% proof alcohol in which some tobacco has been dissolved. The pipe will darken a little and the grain will be more outstanding. It will also get a little piquant taste during the first pipe-fulls. But Love also has stains mixed by himself, used when he finds it appropriate.

The pipes are plain or rusticated. Love however has a strong desire to make sandblasting on his own and is searching for the necessary equipment. He has already tried with a sandblaster used for cars, and at my visit I saw a piped blasted this way. It was quite nice, but I realize it can not be done like that in the future - Love had to blast this single pipe for more than 4 hours.

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Pipes with their own names

Love says it takes an average of 20 hours to make a pipe completely ready and he has no ambition to have a large production. The pipes are stamped with the logo seen in the beginning of this article. He has no grading system (at least not yet) but the pipes are priced 100 – 350 €.

Of course, all Love’s pipes are entirely made by hand and he has no lust or intention to copy shapes from other pipe-makers. Every single pipe has a name of its own and these names are often both witty and imaginative.



Pictured bellow--Logo #17; Bowl type: 21mm Conical -0,83 inches; Airhole size: 4mm - 0,16 inches; Total weight: 40 grams; Bowl Height: 56mm - 2,2 iches; Tobacco hole depth: 46mm - 1,8 inches; Lenght of pipe: 138mm - 5,4 inches; Brior orgin: Italian Crosscut; Description: Another take on our ever popular signature shape, this one slightly taller than we usually make them. This shielded logo pipe has some dazzling Birdseye bout on the shank and shields tight and defined. Partly blasted shields. Shank ring in mammoth Ivory. Stem is hand cut out of high quality German ebonite featuring a delrin tenon and the usual sterling silver ring, this one in the “sun over the mountains “style Drillings are as usual spot on dead center.

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Pictured bellow-- Volcanic Virgin; Bowl type: 18mm Cylindrical; Airhole size: 4mm; Total weight: 32 grams!!; Bowl height: 35mm; Tobacco hole depth: 25mm; Lenght of pipe: 125mm; Briar orgin: Italian Plateaux; Description: A pipe for you clinchers who like the sensation of zero gravity. It has been a while since a volcano came out of the Geiger shop and lately the smaller delicate volcano versions have fallen very much to my liking. So what’s to say about this one. Tight nice grain going around the bowl and shank which I could not help but leave in a virgin finish even though it has 3 small spots. I love smooth unstained pipes and try to keep them like that whenever I can. The birdseyes on this pipe are not that defined and that is reflected in the price.. to some extent this is due to the fact that the pipe is not stained and it will enhance some with smoking. Stem is hand cut out of German ebonite with a delrin tenon.

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From Love's website:

My journey into pipemaking started back in 1997 at the age of 20. After being a pipesmoker for a few years I wanted to try making one myself, not at all being aware of the different materials used in pipemaking, I used soapstone instead of briar and had so much fun in the process that I started to make pipes for friends all around. The soapstone smoked hot and broke easily… As a present from a friend, I received a hundred ebonite stems and a piece of briar and I quickly fell in love. I came in contact with the American carver Trever Talbert (being a great fan of his work) over the net, and started mailing him frequently with different questions regarding the making of pipes, got what books were available on the subject and learned a lot from all my mistakes. The more I got into making pipes the more I wanted to do it to contribute to this outdying craft. My grandmother was a big fashion designer and I grew up with a stepfather who is a glassblower in Skagen so this comes pretty natural to me. The summer of 2002 I left the dusty unheated workshop, bought an old circus wagon and built my shop in it and invested in all the necessary machinery to do serious work: a bandsaw, a quality metal lathe and a beltsander. To learn the lathe I have been visiting Bengt Carlson and will continue doing so as I have such a good time being there.

The briar I carry is mostly the best Corsican plateaux dried for 3 years, but my goal is to have 5 years dried briar soon. The tb hole is often drilled with a 19 or 20 mm cylindrical or a 17mm conical drill and the airhole is drilled with a 4mm drill. I use a beltsander to rough shape my pipes and do the detailing work with a dremel hand drill with different carving heads.

The stems are made from high quality Italian ebonite blanks and colored acrylic (in the process of learning to handcut my own ebonit stems but will not sell till I'm satisfied with how they turn out) I work down the stems around the bite to 4 mm to make them comfortable to have in your mouth and reduce saliva. I spend many hours to get these to fit in harmony with the stummel. For shank extensions and stem rings, I use exotic woods like pockenholtz and masur birch, stabilized wood also use bone and mammoth tooth.

As of yet I have no grading system for my pipes, but price them in a range from 100-350 euro according to the grain, spots and sandpits and and after the grace of the shapes. The pipes are put in a mixture of 96% pure alcohol and tobacco juice to give them a base coloring and a little taste, therefore many of my pipes are "virgin" as I strive to give my customers as clean a smoke as possible. All pipes are stamped Love Geiger Sweden and are polished using only paraffin oil, Tripoli and carnauba wax. Last but not least a thin layer of carbon is added to protect the pipes from burnout's, this is a mild mixture that leaves very little taste to the smoke. The same as Bo Nordh, I put at least 20 hours of work into each pipe I make and strive to give customers good value for their money.

I consider myself a freehand maker first and foremost as no pipe I make is ever exactly the same,and most of my designs are uniquely my own. I do some classic work or my own interpretations thereof, but mostly like to be a little more daring. Living in the countryside my greatest inspiration is the grace of nature with all its shapes and forms. As I am still quite young and have many irons in the fire, music is also a great part of my life, friends and my girlfreind. But having life ahead of me I promise you many pipes to come. Pipes a year 60-??

Love Geiger

Contact information: Tel: +46-44351196; Fax: +46-44320132

Snail mail:

 Love Geiger,Sockenv 474, 29795 Degeberga, Sweden 

Email: mailto:love@geigerpipes.com