Rex keeping ancient pipe art alive
Craftsman Rex Key is keeping an ancient art alive – and seeing his work star on the silver screen.
Rex is continuing the tradition of clay tobacco pipe-making, one of only two people in the country carrying out the ancient craft.
He lives in Broseley, a village which has been producing clay pipes for nearly 400 years.
Now aged 74, Rex is hoping to retire but still fulfils orders for pipes from film and theatre companies, craft centres, and Civil War re-enactors.
He said: “I supply hundreds of pipes to Masonic and Buffalo lodges and also for ‘court leet’ ceremonies where the lords of the manor give staff and tenants a clay pipe as he carries out a rent review.”
A London film studio has also just received 90, 17th Century-style pipes from Rex for use in a film about Cyrano de Bergerac.
Previous films to include his work have been Pirates of the Caribbean, Amazing Grace and The Three Musketeers, as well as the popular TV series Lark Rise to Candleford.
