I really wanted to take one of these pokers and sand down the stain and let the natural wood grains shine through. I found one that looked really promising, sanded it down, and quickly discovered why these pipes were originally stained so dark: the quality of the briar is pretty low and they are covered in pits. 

I tried sanding down the pits to get past them, but some were pretty deep and I wasn’t able to work with them. Instead of letting the pits stand or scrapping the pipe, I decided to add a touch of rustication. The pits on this pipe allowed me to rusticate in the shape of a tornado raining destruction down. It’s fairly appropriate considering I did this pipe in the middle of tornado season here in Oklahoma. 

Here’s the finished pipe. It looks pretty neat and I’m going to keep this for my own use: