Fewer and fewer people smoke cigarettes every year, as younger people decline to take up the habit. However, the worrying trend of vaping is growing exponentially. There's another trend to watch among Millennials, a smaller trend that's growing slowly, but it is growing: pipe smoking. The popular image of a pipe smoker is that of an old man, but that may change.
We’re several generations past the time when parents sent their sons to Yale with pipes and tobacco alongside a fresh toothbrush and new shoes. So it doesn’t feel quite right to say pipe smoking is going through “growing pains,” despite large shifts brought on by technology and culture. Maybe we’re talking about “inclusion pains,” as the hobby grows younger, more wired, and more diverse. Pipe smoking remains, as Kaz Walters put it, “like the wizarding world of Harry Potter. Everywhere, but hidden just below the surface.”
Kevin Smokler talked to pipe vendors, pipe artisans, and pipe fans about the trend that is smoldering right under your nose, at Collectors Weekly. The article includes a history of pipe smoking.
(Image credit: Mary Walters of Walters Photography)