When the owner of Drucquer’s legendary pipe shop in Berkeley, CA, Robert Rex, went over to St. Claude, France, he happened on a drawer with a bunch of old briar that had been overlooked for years. He had Jean LaCroix make fine, classic shapes out of these blocks, put the Drucquer Red Lion on the stem as a logo and had the grades named after various locations in Calif., like Carmel or Big Sur. This pipe is a Sierra Madre and while I don’t know where it rates on the grading ladder, I do know that there are very few of the Drucquer-LaCroix pipes that leave the hands of their owners and make it to my used pipe online emporium. This piece evinces that good branch wood in high sandblast relief. The condition is very good; the vulcanite stem has a mark that’s barely an indent on the bottom and the red lion logo is fully intact on the top of the stem. It’s a Grp. 5 size.
6” long, bowl 1.75” tall. Weight: 1 1/8 oz., 33 grams.