Keresaspa: Difference between revisions

Keresaspa (IPA: Kərəsāspa) pipes are made by Saeed ‘Keresaspa’ Nazarli (b. 1991), an Iranian pipemaker living in Tehran. Keresaspa is the nickname that he goes by, and the name given to his pipes. It is a transliteration of an Avestan word meaning ‘he who owns the slim/fit horses.’ Keresaspa lives with his wife, who also makes pipes under the name Atin.

As a child, Keresaspa showed a keen interest in making things, and would frequently disassemble and his toys in order to discover how they worked. After graduating from high school, he enrolled in university to study chemical engineering, before switching to a course in architecture.

When it came to pipes, Keresaspa was very interested in understanding the engineering behind what makes the mythical ‘perfect smoker,’ and in learning the difference between factory-made pipes and artisan pipes. He was fascinated by high-end pipes, especially those hand made by skilled artisans, but could not afford one for himself.   

Keresaspa’s education in pipemaking came from reading as many articles on the subject as he could find, from magazines, books, and pipemaking forums on the internet. He also studied interviews with pipemakers and videos that showed these artisans and factory carvers demonstrating how pipes are made. Using this information, he experimented with making his first pipes, concentrating first on their functional properties. These pipes were made for his own use, meaning Keresaspa was able to create several stems for the same stummel, making minor adjustments to the diameter of the draught hole or the funnelling of the airway, before testing out how they affected the smoking qualities of the overall pipe. Keresaspa would also sometimes experiment with drilling and redrilling the draught holes of his stummels, combining them with his variously measured stems, in order to discover the ideal combination of the two. To this day, Keresaspa considers the stem to be the most important part of the pipe, meaning he will spend several days only doing stem work until he is satisfied with the outcome.

In terms of influences, Keresaspa remains fascinated by the precise engineering behind the ‘perfect smoke.’ Due to this, a major influence upon Keresaspa’s pipes are the experiments he has undertaken in order to fine-tune the smoking characteristics of a pipe. In addition to this, Keresaspa asks his customers who own high-end artisan pipes to send him lists of their measurements, so that he has more variables to test out for himself.  

Keresaspa is also a great admirer of the aesthetic styles of many of the masters of Scandinavian and Japanese pipemaking, citing Sixten and Lars Ivarsson, Bo Nordh, Jørn Micke, Poul Ilsted, Jess Chonowitsch, Kei ‘Ichi Gotoh, and Hiroyuki Tokutomi as inspirations. However, Keresaspa also remains fond of classical English-French shapes, especially the functionalist simplicity of the humble billiard.

Other sources of inspiration for Keresaspa include a variety of man-made and natural objects, including architecture, as might be expected. One example has been Achaemenid columns, known in the Western world as Persian or Persepolitan columns, which inspired Kersaspa in the shaping and flaring of some of his pipe stems.  

The materials Keresaspa makes his pipes from are briar for the stummels and German ebonite for the stem. Sometimes he will use vintage Bakelite or natural Amber for the stem, if he is given the opportunity. In the past Keresaspa has worked with meerschaum and bog oak, but in recent years he has decided to focus on making briar pipes. He will often utilise shank extensions from bamboo or horn, and has a large collection of decorative materials that he will use as adornments. These include prehistoric fossils such as mammoth tooth or tusk, nacre, amber, horn, bone, exotic woods, and meteoroids.