Erik Nording, having originally been schooled as a machinist and engineer, took up pipe carving as a part time hobby during the 1950s. By the mid-1960s he began professionally carving hand-made pipes in Slangerup, Denmark. Along with a number of other carvers during the 1960s, Erik Nording worked in the new Freehand style that emphasized organic flowing shapes and aesthetically unified stems and bowls.