If there's any American pipemaker that can be said to straddle the line between the Danish and American aesthetics, it's Jeffrey Burt-Gracik of J. Alan Pipes. Self taught to a point with the help of PIMO's Guide To Pipe Crafting At Home and with advice of Tim West, Jeff was eventually instructed under the mentorship of Todd Johnson — a man at the forefront of the American Industrial aesthetic — and later Jody Davis — similarly foundational in the modern US pipemaking scene. Eventually the relationship between the Danish aesthetic the American aesthetic — essentially a blending of the work of the Danes with America's take on the industrial design movement — led Jeff to seek out the mentorship of Tonni Nielsen. In the background of all of this he borrowed from collectors the works of Bo Nordh, Sixten Ivarsson and more in order to replicate and reproduce them — not in order to copy their designs, but to learn what made their designs, aesthetic, and engineering so desirable.

Is it any wonder then that Jeff's signature Billiard shape — a shape that treads the line between the firm, industrial aesthetic of the American school and the easy, fluid disposition of the Danish — would be named the 'Liminal' Billiard? Resulting in a piece of gentle, understated firmness, imbued with a rounded, low-sitting sense of visual weight at the bowl and softly tapering to an easy conclusion at the inflated rim, Jeff presents here a comforting number, with plenty of surface area with which to display a delicate display of finely striated straight grain, ever so lightly contrasted with a honey-blonde finish. It houses plenty of chamber, and the feel in hand is superbly comforting.

— Adam M. O'Neill