Steve Liskey

Steve Liskey is an American artisan pipe maker working in San Bernardino, California. He is best known in the community for bamboo-shanked pipes. In this work, bamboo is not an ornament added afterward to the body but the main element determining the pipe as a whole; the point that sets the maker apart from the many new makers who emerged in the same years is usually explained through this choice.

Line of Training

In Liskey's development, Jeff Gracik, working in California, is cited as a decisive name; according to records other masters also contributed, though these names have not been documented in detail. Starting out in a milieu that held artisan pipe making to high standards is linked to his having, from his very first pieces, kept a rigorous line on technical points such as mouthpiece (stem) workmanship, the fit of mouthpiece to shank, surface finishing, and the internal channel arrangement. These four headings are the customary measures used to gauge a master's maturity in American artisan pipe making.