Sébilo

Sébilo is a small pipe workshop founded by French maker Patrice Sébilo in 1987 in the Breton town of Herbignac. The brand owes its reputation largely to a single material: oak drawn from the region's Brière marshes, blackened after centuries underwater — that is, morta (bog oak). The workshop closed in 2002; its fixtures and material stock passed to another maker.

From Carpentry to the Bench

Patrice Sébilo was born in 1957 in the Brière region of Brittany. He started out as a furniture carpenter, then spent thirteen years in the machine and aerospace industry. In 1987 he changed course and returned to wood, setting up his own bench in Herbignac. He quickly became a recognized name in his field. Although he handed part of his output over to machine work, the workshop never grew beyond that scale; he kept the work as a craft rather than mass production. By the time it closed, he was, according to records, the last pipe maker still active in Brittany.