The knives I made for myself. A case study.

I couldn’t call myself a bladsmith and sell knives unless I made and used some myself. Making a set for myself gave me the opportunity to experiment, and to focus purely on what I thought, not worrying about outside input. I chose to make a set of three, which I would almost always recommend. I don’t know anyone (outside of professionals) who uses more than three different knives for normal cutting tasks on a day to day basis, not including cake/bread knives etc, just normal ‘prep’ knives. In fact I suspect most people only use two types, small petty knives, and larger general purpose chefs/kitchen knives.

This is my longest and most detailed case study, to give you a flavour of what goes into making a bespoke knife set and perhaps some ideas for your own.
I chose to make a petty knife, a general purpose knife, and a long slicer. I also decided to make sayas for them, but I wanted to experiment with different styles rather than make all three the same, which is why there is a bit of a mongrel range of them in the photograph below.

For the steel and materials i wanted to keep it relatively simple, but add some nice touches that are pleasing to the eye. The wood is all a single block of mexican cocobolo. Cocobolo is an interesting wood, when freshly cut is is bright and heavily contrasted, with almost purple darker stripes and pine coloured lighter ones. then it starts to age. as it ages it darkens and becomes less contrasted and picks up a slight orange hue to its shades of brown. If it darkens while wet the orange colour becomes really overpowering and unpleasant, you will see that in a couple of places in the sayas. so its essential to oil the fresh surfaces and keep them dry (a lesson I learned too late).
The steel I chose was ultra low layer twist for the larger knives, and a double twist pattern for the smaller one to give it some extra detail. I deliberately etched them to a low contrast, because high use blades with a high contrast rapidly look ragged and damaged. the low contrast helps conceal minor damage and the effects of sharpening. This photo is after a year of use, not brand new. You can see the pattern has faded towards the edges, from sharpening and particularly stropping, which always blends the edge.

The design of the knives has a lot of common features across the set

• Handle design: I went for a multi-faceted and slightly angular handle design. the advantage of this is very positive grip and indexing, and thus precise control, the disadvantage is some hand sizes or positions will not be as comfortable. I also like the aesthetic of the facets and the curved bellys.

• Blade shape: continuing the angled theme, I made the blades what I call a ‘double K-tip’ profile. the typical straight spine of a k-tip bunka and santouko style japanese blade, but with a double angled tip instead of a straight one. I did this for two reasons: Firstly because I like the aesthetic, and secondly it allows slightly reduced bulk without sacrificing strength in the tip. A good combination, I will use it again..

• Layered bronze bolster: This is something of a signature for my knives, a forged, layered bronze bolster. hard to see when freshly polished but becomes much more visible with aging. I have not seen this before on another maker’s knives in this way. I take different grades of bronze and solder them together with silver solder and then forge them. This leaves a slightly wavy line between the layers, with a streak of bright silver in the different coloured bronzes. it is similar to Mokume-gane, but has a different aesthetic, and typically thicker, bolder layers.

The petty knife

The 5” petty knife has a really stout blade, inflexible, for delicate cutting and particularily using the tip. its not broad enough for rocking cutting on a flat board, your fingers would get in the way. the heel of the blade is cut at an angle to give you a little more space, and a little less risk of cutting your fingers. You shouldnt be using that part of a paring knife anyway, so the loss of the edge in that area is no loss at all. the saya is a ‘slipper’ type where the knife slides in from the top, and is two parts with a copper spacer. A bit of a mix of new techniques I was trying.

The chef’s knife

The 6” chefs knife has a bunka blade style, with the difference of the ‘double k-tip’ which softens the outline. its deep at the heel, with a rounded cut out to allow rocking cutting, slicing, use of the point and is thin and flexible to allow filleting and various other jobs to be done adequately. that is the point of a general purpose kitchen knife, it is a jack of all trades, and does everything adequately, nothing as well as a specialist knife. This knife is lightweight, and the saya is built to match. The Saya is a single piece, thin walled, faceted and profiled block with a rounded button pin and a cut out to recess the bolster.

The 7” slicer

This is my favorite, but also the least used of my knives. which is not uncommon as a paradox with knives. Its my favorite because it is just a superb slicer, straight edged, long, razor sharp, rakish and evil looking. Its my least used because its really only good for slicing meat and large veg, and not nearly as versatile as the chef’s knife since, with the straighter and less angled edge, you cant rock or push cut with it very well. Nor is it as good for fiddly jobs as the paring knife. trying to do delicate work with the tip of a 7” heavy knife like this is just faintly silly. So i dont use it that often, but when there is a large ‘thing’ to slice, I enjoy getting this monster out of the cupboard.
The blade design is just like the general purpose blade but stretched and made less angled. this is more akin to a santouko, although it is not completely comparable. To go with its stiffer blade it has a bulked up ricasso with a shoulder, to give the back of the blade less ‘give’ which helps when cutting thick or tough ‘things’ precisely.

The saya of this blade is more complex in construction but simpler in shape, with a bronze backplate and a more blocky design. It features a flat, asymmetrical and angular saya pin that rotates to lock into place and be out of the way, another novel feature that i will definitely use again. I love the heavy, thick, meaty bronze on this knife and saya. The feel of weight and the smooth, polished facets is very satisfying to the look and touch.