Ascorti and Radice are like two peas in a pod

[fishnbanjo]

Still riding the pink cloud and keeping it smokey with Dark Star. Never could smoke one of my Ascorti pipes without following it one by Radice, this rusticated Rhodesian has a diamond shape faux bamboo shank.
banjo

 

[Lonecoyote]

Banjo, that's a WOW!! Amazing design/shape, I've never smoked a Radice I didn't enjoy! I just took out my magnifying glass to view a close-up, amazing carving and blast. The lines are perfect around the bowl. it's one of my top three favorite pipes you've been showing/smoking from your fabulous pipe collection.

  It's tough for me to say....today I would purchase a Radice over all other Italian made pipes. Yup, even over Castello, which I also have and enjoy.


REAL GLAD YOUR KEEPING IT SMOKEY

 

[fishnbanjo]

I've said it before Lonecoyote, I have many beautiful Italian made pipes in my collection, including my beloved Becker and Castello pipes, but if I were relegated to only one Italian Pipemaker it would be Radice hands down.
banjo

 

[Lonecoyote]

Banjo, thanks!!! It's good to know how you feel about Radice pipes. Greatly appreciate all your sharing :cheers: :cheers:



KEEP ON PUFFING!!!

 

[Zeno Marx]

Radice's faux bamboo is the only bamboo I like on a pipe. I remember the first time I saw one of those and thinking how clever it was.

I haven't smoked a Radice that wasn't made in the early 90s, so I could be wrong about this. He was using some of the finest briar, if not THE finest briar. Light. Dense. Cool smoking. Sweet smoking. I must've owned a dozen of those early-90s Radices, and they all smoked incredible from the first light. I had one particularly ugly full bent, saddle stem, paper-thin walled Rind billiard that had absolutely no reason to smoke as fantastic as it did. Everything about it looked wrong. The full bent saddle stem (that was also slightly twisted when it was formed, so the bowl sat just slightly out of line). Those thin walls. But incredibly light, great wood that could smoke any kind of tobacco, at any speed, as often as you'd like, and never get hot, wet, or smoke poorly. An absolute workhorse of a pipe that was a true ugly duckling. A freak of nature. A defier of physics.

 

[hobie1dog]

I've never been near either of those brands,likely never will get to either. Thanks for sharing this with us.

 

[smoker13]

I LOVE my two Radice pipes, both under the "Clear" designation. A beautiful bent Dublin with gorgeous plateau that came with a genuine bamboo and brass tamper, and a recent acquisition, a panel octagon straight billiard. Both are a joy to smoke, the first an hour + and the second just shy of an hour. Pure, sublime joy!