Ashton

The Ashton pipe story began in 1983 when Bill Ashton Taylor left the Dunhill factory to start his own brand. He knew he could produce classic English shapes and Quaints with character.  Bill set a new level with his deep, well defined sandblasting the showed the craggy qualities of each block in detail. He also created a new finish Pebble Cut (a rusticated & sandblast mix) that was patented.  The stems were made from vulcanite or acrylic and from of a hand-cut acrylic called "Ashtonite".

Bill died in September 2009 and Jimmy Craig (also a former Dunhill pipeman) took over the production of the Ashton brand (he stamps JC on the pipes in addition to the regular stampings). Continuing the Bill Taylor tradition every Ashton pipe is oil cured, all stems are hand-cut from solid vulcanite rod and each is done with the same sandblasting technique that Ashtons have become famous for. A few pipes will have silver bands as adornment, but most are classic shapes with no adornment. 

The Ashton Pipe Story