Hardcastle

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This article desperately needs further information and photo examples. Please contribute if you have any expertise or photo examples of Hardcastle pipes.

Hardcastle Counter Display Ad

Harcastle was started in 1908 by Edmund Hardcastle and was run independently until Dunhill built a factory next door to Hardcastle in 1935. They bought 49% of the company in 1936, and in 1946 Dunhill bought the remianing shares. In 1967, after merging with Parker, they became Parker-Hardcastle Ltd.

Today, Hardcastle is a Parker and Dunhill second in that it is suspected that much of the briar and many of the turned bowls that are not deemed suitable to bare either the Dunhill or Parker names are funneled down and made into Hardcastles, yet Harcastle also obtains briar from other sources.

John Loring states in "The Dunhill Briar Pipe - 'the patent years and after'" that in the absence of sales receipts, or other items of provenance, Hardcastles cannot be accurately dated. Loring further states that he knows of no way to distinguish the briar source when looking at Hardcastle, Parker, or Parker-Hardcastle pipes. We should not expect to find any actual Dunhill production in these lines, and while one might be there, it is doubtful we will ever be able to determine it [1].