Sasieni Family Era (c.1946-50) Four Dot Brooklands Rusticated Bulldog Estate Briar Pipe, English Estates

Along with names like Barling, Charatan, and Dunhill Sasieni holds a special place in the history of English smoking pipes—one near to its very beginnings. So the story goes, Sasieni himself worked for Dunhill during its early days. But eventually he left Dunhill, having his own ideas about how pipes should be made, and founded Sasieni. This was 1919, and Sasieni has been the closest thing to a household name in English pipes ever since. After a legal battle with Dunhill prevented Sasieni from using a one dot stem inlay, Joel Sasieni was forced to come up with a new way of marking the company’s most perfect pipes. So, Sasieni started using inlays comprised of four dots, instead. Thus was born the “Four Dot,” which, funnily enough, came to rival even Dunhill’s “White Spot” as a signifier for high-grade, English-made pipes. Interestingly enough, in a time marked by a shift toward smooth polished straight grain as a short-hand for high-end pipes, Sasieni introduced the “Rustic Briar,” which would later simply be known as the “Rustic.” This was a line of wholly rusticated pipes, but one which was also a part of the Four Dot umbrella. It was thus one of the first examples of a high-grade rusticated finish, a legacy that would be continued in the 20th century by English and Italian artisan and workshop briars. The success of Sasieni’s Rustic Briar/Rustic is no doubt largely attributable to the technique involved in achieving that finish. Instead of merely chopping away at the briar without much thought for what was underneath, Sasieni’s craftsmen would instead direct their tools at the wood’s natural grain patterns, bringing them into relief in a manner not entirely like a good sandblast. Sasieni’s marketing was quick to emphasize that, because every block of briar possesses its own distinct patterning, every rusticated Four Dot would be just as unique. Having handled quite a few of them in my time, I can attest to that being the case. This particular example comes from a time before rusticated Four Dots were stamped with the “Rustic” nomenclature (with the sole exception of the “Stump,” which is a story for another time). Instead, judging by that nomenclature, it looks to have been made just after the Second World War, at the very beginning of Alfred Sasieni’s tenure at the helm of the Sasieni company, after Joel Sasieni’s passing in 1946. As distinct finish stamps were introduced around 1950, that would place this pipe before then, so, approximately a 1946-50 make. The condition is good. Slight inner rim darkening and some general finish fading. Certainly not bad for a roughly 80 year-old pipe, though.   Details: Length: 5.9″ / 149.8mm Bowl Width: 0.81 / 20.57mm Bowl Depth: 1.37″ / 34.79mm Weight: 1.3oz / 38g