Olive Wood Pipes

Olive wood pipes is the name given to pipes made from the wood of the olive tree (Olea europaea), the emblem of the Mediterranean basin. Among woods other than briar, it's one of the most widely used; thanks to both its hardness and its visibly striking grain pattern, it has long been a material pipe makers turn to.

Material Properties

The olive tree grows very slowly and can live for centuries; the trunk diameter thickens only over many years. This slow growth gives the wood a dense, hard structure. Wood reference data typically give its specific gravity at 12% moisture as roughly 0.98, with a unit weight of around 980 kg/m³; its Janka hardness is around 2,700 lbf, a value that places olive among the upper tier of hardwoods. The grain can be straight, or it can be intricate and irregular; the texture is fine, evenly distributed, and gives a surface with a measured natural sheen. Curved, wavy, or burl-like patterns are common, and this pattern differs markedly from the regular lines sought in briar grain.

As lumber, olive isn't abundant through commercial channels. Since healthy trees are kept for their fruit, the material that reaches workshops mostly comes from pruning waste, broken branches, or diseased orchard trees. This limits block size and makes larger-bowled shapes difficult.