Peterson POY 2011

In the small batch of vintage Petes I acquired not too long ago was the Kapruf 572 seen in the banner, one of K&P’s panel shapes from the first half of the 20th century. I had seen Andy Camire’s fabulous 444 Square Panel at the 2019 Chicago show but never thought to see another in real life. The Panel group all seem to be Group 1 to 3 in size, smaller than many pipe smokers turn to these days, but—and I speculate—probably suitable to the shorter and more frequent smokes that were once typical of many men's days in the office. Detail from the 1925 Phillip Weiss & Söhne trifold The first group of K&P panels appeared in the 1925 Phillip Weiss & Söhne K&P trifold preserved in the Peterson archive. It consists of five stunningly faceted shapes. These are all from the mysterious IFS period (1922-38) when bowl number stamping was just beginning to appear. There is little in the way of catalog ephemera from this period, making shape identification sometimes difficult. But these five shapes—the 3071 octagon, 3079 faceted hexagon, 3070 prince hexagon, 3088 hexagon and 3085 hexagon—announced in no uncertain terms that K&P wasn’t going to be left behind as fashions in shapes and sizes shifted. It is impossible to do more than speculate about the drastic aesthetic shift on display here. K&P didn’t abandon their earlier design language of course, but these five shapes mark the inclusion of a something new. Is it a shift from masculine to feminine? Muscular to lithe? It seems like part of the broader Art Deco sensibility of the 1920s, especially when set against the Art Nouveau of the previous 40 years. I’m not sure the last set of terms is applicable, but perhaps someone with knowledge in design history can enlighten us.  I’m also curious to know whether there was a sense of gender association behind the marketing of these shapes: were they targeted specifically for women? For cosmopolitan (metrosexual?) men? Or for anyone looking for something fresh, elegant and a bit smaller? Andy Camire’s 444 Square Panel The next panel appears in the 1937 catalog, seen above from Andy Camire’s collection, which was the 2020 in 1st Quality and “K” and 444 in Kapet & DeLuxe Classic. It’s probably a group 3 (Andy can tell us if he reads this post) and has a bit more heft than the 572 in the banner photo and the quintet of shapes from 1925. The 444 is the sole panel in the catalog, probably a place marker, as this catalog was not intended to illustrate every shape in production but only the representative and most popular ones. This shape is still in the Dunhill catalog and unlike the faceted panels of the 1920s, it has a perennial masculine style that seems iconic of the 1940s. If I were to make a movie of one of Raymond Chandler's novels, this would be my choice for his hard-boiled detective Phillip Marlowe. Detail from the…