It really is a beautiful pipe. It doesn't photograph well in artificial light, but the grain is amazing. Straight all the way around, and gorgeous birdseye on the bottom. I love it. It's by far my most valuable pipe, a "AA" grade Rainer Barbi. Barbi was a legendary German pipe maker. There are "legends" who earn it by making things well (precision boring, other physical characteristics), those who do so with their competence at managing grain (figuring out what shape a particular block of briar wants to be), and those who bring natural-born artistry. Barbi was one of few who brought all of that. He frequently made museum quality art piece pipes that went for thousands of dollars US.
This particular pipe is not an art piece in the sense of being one of his original shapes, or sculpture work - but it is one of his higher grades. There were actually 3 higher grades than this one possible, but they were rare and at times he refused to assign them even - his one shortcoming was being somewhat finicky and erratic with grade assignment; every collector I've talked to who held and examined mine have agreed it was undergraded. Even back in the day when I had a much higher income, I had to sell *a lot* of things to justify the purchase.
His standards were extremely high and his reputation/relationship with suppliers secured him probably the best selection of briar in his day. He was known to throw away beautiful - and expensive - chunks of wood because the boring came off 0.5mm from his desired placement. He had an incredible knack for pulling shapes from a block of wood that made for spectacularly grained pipes. He died about 7 years ago, and you don't see a lot of his work in the market any more, because collectors tend to hold on to them. These days, you see a lot of people charging ridiculous amounts of money for far lesser pipes. I blame the hipsters. They seem to think the fact that they put a lot of time into something makes it more valuable. Things like the leather "tobacco mats" I've seen recently. Some dude cuts a 10" square of leather and spends 12 hours rubbing it with fru-fru oil and thinks it's worth $100. I don't get it. Anyway, I digress.
As for the Aperitif, it is very good. I don't know that it is the most phenomenal change I've seen in an aging tin of tobacco, but very good. It's more sedate than when fresh, and perhaps less "dark and smoldering" and more "bright and crisp" - which was a surprise. I'll report back when I've had more than a bowl or two.
As a side note, don't be fooled by CI's "r. barbi" pipes. They took some of Barbi's characteristic shapes and commissioned them from another maker. It was one of the mass production houses, but I don't remember which (Hilson, maybe?) - those pipes go for $100 or so, and have no relation to Rainer Barbi except the fact that he either first created the shape, or made them a single example of an existing shape that they could clone. CI/Pipesandcigars used to put them in the paper magazines they sent out, and used what I personally felt were deceptive practices in marketing them. They *seemed* to be Barbi's work, but were absolutely not.
