326. The Making of the 25th Anniversary St. Patrick’s Day Pipes: An Interview with Glen Whelan, Josh Burgess & Jonathan Fields at K&P
Last Thursday afternoon, Glen Whelan (Director of Sales), Josh Burgess (Managing Director) and Jonathan Fields (Factory Manager) and I got together for a chat on the making of the 25th anniversary St. Patrick’s Day Commemorative. But before we begin, here’s the essentials on Tuesday’s drop party: SPC drop, per Andy Wike, “The pipes are scheduled to go up at 6:00pm ET on Jan 31” SPE drop, per Adam O’Neill: “We'll be dropping them in our weekly update on Tuesday at 10:00am Dublin time.” OTHER RETAILERS: I’ve already seen several up on eBay and elsewhere, so if you have a favorite Pete shop, do patronize them or make inquiries. Smooth tricolor band, terracotta finish, brass inlaid P, vulcanite F/T, serialized out of 1200, with Donegal tweed pipe bag; MSRP $220. Blast tricolor band, black, brass inlaid P, acrylic F/T, serialized out of 1200, with Donegal tweed pipe bag; MSRP $170. Rustic tricolor band, white paint retro P, acrylic F/T, not serialized; cloth pipe bag; MSRP $120. Shapes—more than I can count, a few of them quite surprising!* Having said that, I will say that in the case of a few of the shapes, there will only be a handful, so if there’s something out of the way or a shape you’re really hoping to find, you should plan on attending one or both drop parties. ’Nuff said! The old-school white P on the rustic SPD 25: how I love these! Mark: There’s a lot to admire and mull over in this release. The tricolor band’s workmanship is wonderful. The white-paint P on the rustic issue is another wonderful touch, a real throwback that we don’t see enough of. The serialized numbering of the chestnut smooths and black blasts. The use of a matte natural contrast on the rustic and its smooth stamping area. The gold color inlaid P on the serialized issues—what a great touch! It adds so much to the black blast and the terracotta smooths as well as provides unity with the brass sandwich on the tricolor band. A stroke of genius. Yikes. I’ll begin with the gold color inlaid P. How did that come about? Jonathan: We’ll hand that to Glen—it was his call on that! Mark: You don’t see that inlay often. Glen: No, we don’t use them very often at all. On the gold band Sherlock Holmes pipes and some of the old Supremes. Used to be on twenty or so pipes, absolute tops. Mark: That gold color P seems to have been first seen back in the 1950s or so on the highest grades. Mark: I think Josh told me you headed up this project, Glen, but how does this collaborative model work? This project looks to be one of the most impressive K&P has ever done. Glen: It begins when Josh and Sykes come over from the US toward the tail end of the year and we think about series for the coming year. We always try to associate a project with an anniversary…