Karl Erik

Karl Erik is the pipe brand Danish maker Karl Erik Ottendahl (1942-2004) built from his two given names. The Danish School usually brings to mind pieces made in small numbers, one-off and expensive; Ottendahl set his goal at the exact opposite and tried to turn the freehand pipe into a product a moderate-income smoker could afford.

In doing so he built a distinctive system that did not conceal bench assistance, while leaving the final shaping to the hand. A production life spanning nearly forty years encompassed both a fifteen-person factory and a one-man workshop.

From Aalborg to Nairobi

Ottendahl was born in Aalborg, in the north of the Jutland peninsula. He encountered pipes at fourteen; after finishing school he began an apprenticeship in lithography at sixteen. Carving pipes was, in these years, a leisure pursuit; most of his early pieces were given as gifts to senior masters at his workplace. In 1962 he went to Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, to continue his trade; unable to find a pipe he liked there, he met his own need by hand. When he returned to his country three years later, lithography was not providing him enough income, so he began selling a few pipes to boost his earnings. He gave these pieces his two given names and stamped them with the letters "KE." When a few of Copenhagen's major tobacconists took the pipes onto their shelves, the direction of the business changed: Ottendahl acquired better lathes and moved into the trade full time. The brand's beginning is generally placed in the records at the mid-1960s.