Kulpinski (Ryszard Kulpiński)

Kulpinski is the name Polish pipe master Ryszard Kulpiński carries on the pipes he produces in the city of Przemyśl. This small city in the country's southeast has been considered the center of Polish pipemaking since the last quarter of the nineteenth century; Kulpiński is one of the masters connected to that tradition's postwar generation.

The Przemyśl Tradition and Apprenticeship

Pipemaking in the city began in the 1870s. Czech-born craftsman Wincenty Swoboda began carving pipes in a basement in 1889 and set up his own workshop in 1908. Production, which stopped with Swoboda's death in 1941, was revived in 1945 when the Walat brothers opened a workshop. Ryszard Kulpiński joined this workshop in 1956 and learned the craft there.

These years at the bench were also a schooling in coping with shortage of materials. Because briar imports were irregular under the socialist period, Polish pipes were long carved from domestic woods such as pear and walnut. According to the pipe literature, conditions eased somewhat after 1970; Kulpiński is credited with a share in the success of the Walat workshop's products, which came to be widely known by the name "Walatówka" during the 1971-1981 period.