Mastro Grandolfo

Mastro Grandolfo is an Italian Pipemaker from Lecce. Online gallery: www.mastrograndolfo.com

I learned to build the pipe from my maternal grandfather. After the Second World War, during the great reconstruction of Italy, my grandfather start a tobacco shop. He also built pipes and lighters with the shells of bullets.

Before I was born, he sold the tobacco shop, but has continued to build pipes.

When I was 6 age old, I went for the first time in his laboratory. I remember the light that came in through the high windowless and cut the darkness, let see the wood dust in the air. There was a scent of olivewood and humidity. I was fascinated, I was a child in the laboratory of Merlin.

As you can imagine, spending time with my grandfather, I learned to build pipe as a game.