Steffen Mueller (the Pipemill)

Steffen Mueller (1966-2024) was a pipe maker who worked in the Ortenau region of southwestern Germany and signed his pipes with the name "The Pipemill." He took up the craft in his forties, largely self-taught, and in a production career of less than fifteen years made a name for himself in international collecting circles by favoring shapes that conveyed a sense of movement over classic molds.

From Stuttgart to Ortenau

He was born in Stuttgart on 24 February 1966 and studied biology. After living abroad for a time, he settled in 1995 in the region where the Rhine valley meets the Black Forest, near the French border. Both his home and his workshop were in Niederschopfheim, part of Hohberg; he had built his workspace himself in his front garden.

Sources do not fully agree on what he did professionally before pipes. According to the local press, he had worked for about twenty years as a civil servant at the district administration office (Landratsamt), giving up his secure job to become a freelance artist; in an interview he gave for Pipedia, however, he states that he stopped working as a biologist and made his living from pipe making. He made his first pipe in 2009 and for a while produced only for himself. When he set up a small workshop and began selling in 2010, his first pipe was bought by his colleague Roger Wallenstein, who is also counted among those who guided him.