Elliott Pipes

Elliott Pipes is the brand under which Alabama tobacconist Skip Elliott produces handmade American pipes under his own name. Because Elliott's main occupation is retail, production has never scaled up to workshop level, remaining a one-man, low-volume pursuit. For this reason, the brand is known within the American artisan pipe tradition more for its individually handled, low-volume examples.

From Tobacconist to Pipe Maker

Skip Elliott founded the tobacconist shop The Briary with his family in 1974. The shop spent its early years on the upper floor of Brookwood Mall in Birmingham; after twenty-six years at that address, it moved in November 2000 to a restored old farmhouse in Homewood. According to reports, Elliott, who handled hundreds of pipes daily, did not begin making pipes with his own hands until 1989; this date rests on a single account in pipe literature and is not backed by independent record. Production takes place not in the shop but in a small workshop attached to his home. Sources diverge on the workshop's location: some say Maylene in Shelby County, others the neighboring town of Alabaster.

Elliott positions himself not as a pipe maker but as a retailer who feeds his love of pipes through making them. This shows in his working pace: by his own account, a good month yields only two finished pipes, and a single pipe demands more than thirty hours of work.