I made these!

I made these. Clearly I rock!

Takeda san, a very patient teacher.

 I always have a great time in Japan. The food is outstanding, the people warm, the temples and shrines peaceful. I especially like the local train ride to Niimi. The train weaves through cute rounded hills covered in pine forests. Every valley has mist a stream and a tiny lake. It really is magical.

Takeda san collected me at the train station with some good news. I was going to make a few knives with one of my knife making heros.


It was soo fun....and sweaty.  I am ceratinly not a natural. I think the blades look alright, but they do feel like hammers. A bit on the heavy side, if you will. I can't wait to do it again.

Takeda san was kind enough to finish the blades for me and put handles on the santoku. 

Thank you Shosui, it was a highlight of my life.

BTW I got to make a few blades with the Moritakas the very next day. I'll post some pics when they arrive. What a great trip!!

Tsukasa Hinoura and Konosuke. New sexiness from Japan!

Knives from Hinoura san have finaly arrived. We've been waiting a long time. Tsukasa Hinoura san is from Sanjo, just outside of Niigata. He is a third generation knife maker and has been forging since he was 22 years old (that's 31 years experience now). His method of twisted damascus steel is unique and totally cool. The blade is forged from #1 Shirogami (HRC63ish) and the handle is octogon magnolia wood and water buffalo. These knives are so fabulous in the looks department with the 'twisted' Damascus pattern that he has won awards twice at the Seki knife show. Truely works of art from the man himself.

Petty 135mm $791
Santoku 165mm $1339
Nakiri $1339
Gyuto 210mm $1756

Konosuke Knives are a great little knife company based in Sakai, just outside of Osaka. This knife is hand forged from Ginsan stainless steel. Ginsan is, in my opinion, a knife makers steel of the future. It cuts smooth like carbon steel, sharpens as easy as carbon steel, but is stainless. What a great idea. But what really sets these apart is the mirror polished sakura (cherry blossom) pattern. Easily the sexiest knife in the world. I have seen the process, but have been sworn to secrecy about how the mirrored blossoms are hand polished onto the blade. Each blade comes with a handmade wooden saya (sheath).

It's been hard keeping these in stock since we started carrying them in July.

petty 120mm $285

petty 150mm $298

nakiri 165mm $350

santoku 165mm $387

gyuto 180mm $387

gyuto 210mm $466

Here is a new one with same kind pattern, but obviously based on a different plant.....................................A Japanese maple of course. Comes with a Japanese maple and water buffalo horn handle.
165mm Santoku $398

This is my fave new stuff. Also from Konosuke these are mirror polished by hand. They are sandvivk stainless steel, which means they will always be super mirro shiny. Check out our wave logo reflected in the blade. Next time I'm on TV this will be my go-to knife. It will look sick!!! Oh, also, these knives are made exclusively for Knifewear. Konosuke makes knives that look like this, but only in Sandvick steel for us. Cool huh? Waterproof hoo wood and water buffalo horn handle. Did I mention they are as light and as thin as any knife I've ever held. They cut like a dream.
 
120mm petty $284
150mm petty $295
165mm Nakiri $340
165mm Santoku $346
180mm Gyuto $361
210mm Gyuto $381
240mm Gyuto $422

Christmas in Inglewood

Knifewear will be participating in Inglewood's customer appreciation night, Christmas in Inglewood, again this year. It is a super fun night out. Many, many shops stay open late and offer great deals, samples, entertainment. A fun way to kick-off or maybe even finish your Christmas shopping.

We will be offering 10% off all nine lines of Masakage Knives in the shop that evening. Aviv Fried (Calgary's best bread baker) will be with us serving awesome samples and loaves to buy. Pierre Lamielle (Swerve's 'Easy Cook') will also be in the house signing cookbooks and generally being a nuisance.

Thursday November 18  6pm - 9pm

Movember

The Mo, slang for moustache, and November come together each year for Movember.
Movember challenges men to change their appearance and the face of men’s health by growing a moustache. The rules are simple, start Movember 1st clean-shaven and then grow a moustache for the entire month. The moustache becomes the ribbon for men’s health, the means by which awareness and funds are raised for prostate cancer. Much like the commitment to run or walk for charity, the men of Movember commit to growing a moustache for 30 days.

Knifewear's Gentlemen have joined as a Movember team. In fact we've challenged Phil & Sebastian Coffee Roasters to a fund raising competition. Winners get to brag and bad mouth the losers for a whole year.

Please donate here:   http://ca.movember.com/mospace/852290/

Rob, obviously, is our spiritual leader. May we all grow as well as him.

Knife makers in the house.

Knifewear is super excited to announce that Shibata san and Kato san of Masakage knives will be in the shop Saturday 25 September. Kato san is a renowned knife maker from Takefu village who has been making knives for the last 51 years. Not bad huh? Shibata san is Hiroshima's top knife sharpener and has a unique method of sharpening knives using a different grit on each side of the blade.

Shibata sna and Kato san will be answering questions, showing off new products, sharpening Maskage knives, and generally being cool.

All Maskage knives will be 10% for the weekend (Sept 25-Sept 26).

Calgary Tours

Super fun news. Patrick Dunn of InterCourse Chef Services is offering culinary tours of Calgary. Knifewear is one of the big stops. We will offer a quick little 'Cut Like A Chef' class for the tour. The next on takes place this Saturady (July 24). For more infor please see the link below. I look forward to seeing you on the tour.

http://us1.campaign-archive.com/?u=c96441981536d2b798c4a6422&id=0fca0fdbdb

Calgary food in Vancouver Sun

Nice article about  Calgary food in the Vancouver Sun today. Some of my fave restaurants were mentioned as was a certain knife shop.  As any good report about Calgary's food scene should be, Inglewood was featured prominently.

http://www.vancouversun.com/life/From+Cowtown+culinary+capital/3251994/story.html

Kawamura san will be in the shop Sunday

We are super excited to announce that Kawamura san from Konosuke Knives will be in the shop this Sunday (July 11) from 12-4. He has promised to bring some super sexy stuff and at a special price. Pop by to say Hi. He would love to meet you. This is one of Konosuke knives. It's not shiny, but an actual mirror.

The Shirts are HERE!!!!!

Super great news. Our new yummy horse themed shirts have arrived. We only had 100 printed and the first 20 went out the door yesterday and today. Look around town for some foodie celebs sporting our super cool shirts. Get 'em while we still got 'em.

Calgary Stampede is coming!!!

To celebrate the Calgary Stampede we have new shirts designed by our fave designer, Pierre Lamielle.

The shirts have a yummy horse theme and are printed in classic Rock and Roll cliche colours (white on a black t-shirt) on Hanes tagless shirts. They will be available in dudes sizes (sm, med, lg, xl, xxl) and only $20.

We have printed only 100 shirts, so first come first serve. Give us a bell at the shop to reserve yours. 403 514-0577

Ya hoooo!!!

MEDDIA WHORE ALERT!!

Calgary's weekly arts and listings magazine, FFWD, just did a fun little feature of moi. I am feeling a bit of a riockstar again. It will be leather pants and sunglasses at the shop for the next week....again.

http://www.ffwdweekly.com/article/life-style/your-face-here/kevin-kent-owner-knifewear-5847/

There is also a great write up of Sugo Restaurant and Bar. Nice one Angelo, I'll pop in for some happy champers with you later today.

As a side note we have a special Calgary Stampede shirt coming out next week for just $20. It is a cool new design by Pierre Lamielle http://www.kitchenscraps.ca/ . A bit offensive to some even. I like it.

Masakage Knives launch party

Masakage Knives started as bit of fun for Shibata san and myself. While in Banff (January 2009) we spoke about what we loved  about kitchen knives and what would make our perfect knives. By June we had our first line available at Knifewear.  A good bit of fun really.  Now we are ready to launch Masakage Knives. We currently have seven lines each consisting of 2-9 blades.

Shibata san is Hiroshima's top knife sharpener and I am arguably Canada's largest knife nerd. At least the nerdiest. We have been sending prototypes back and forth, selecting the steel we want for each line, choosing handles, adjusting shape, height and width of individual blades, fine tuning the appearance of each knife and naming each line. This was/is one of the most fun times of my life. I believe we've created kitchen knives that are new, unique and desirable.

Masakage knives are all handmade in Japan by four of our favourite blacksmiths. Kato san, Anryu san and Kuroskai san hail from Takefu. Kageura san works on Shikoku Island near Tosa.

The knives represent what we love in kitchen knives. High performance, sexiness and personality. As you can imagine we are more than a bit proud of these knives.

 Currently Masakage knives are available exclusively through Knifewear.

Our launch party for Masakage Knives is at Knifewear on Tuesday 4 May starting at 6pm. Beer by Wildrose Brewery and food by Sugo. Hope to see you then.

Trust us we are professionals

More great press

I really feel like a rock star. It will be leather pants and sunglasses all the way next time you're in the shop. And if you look hard enough you can find a link to a video to go with the article. Cool huh?

http://www.avenuecalgary.com/articles/page/item/the-expert%3A-kevin-kent

New Gallery

Yay!! We now have a new knife making gallery. Check it out. These are all picutres taken on my last trip to Japan. I especially like the picture of Fujiwara san and his sword. He can make you one as well if you have a spare $100,000.

http://knifewear.com/japanese-knife-gallery.asp

Staff Update

This is Rance. He is our part-time Go-To-Man. You may see him on the weekends, helping out with sharpening classes or at events away from the shop.

Rance is a Knife Nerd who found our shop while shopping for better Japanese knives. After spending an our with us he asked for a job. He really is one of us.

Welcome aboard.

Meet the New Staff

 

As regular visitors to the shop will know, Toru has returned to Japan. His plan is to apprentice as a blacksmith, possibly with Iwasaki san the most talented straight razor maker in the world or with a knife maker. I can't wait to use your handy work, Toru.

We are mega happy to welcome Mark and Kasumi to the team. Mark is a knife nerd from way back as well as a carpenter and drummer. You can find Mark behind the kit of the Steve McQueen Band most Saturday nights. Kasumi comes to us from that great city of Tokyo. She is easily the most professional and organised of us all. BTW her Japanese and English are flawless. Her French is pretty good as well.

Welcome aboard Mark and Kasumi. The shop is a better place again.

We are as cool as John Deer and Budweiser

Yes, it true that we are officially super cool. We have ball hats and new shirts!! The hats say "don't touch my knives" on the back. And I hope the Ramones don't sue us over the shirt design. Thanks, Keith, for modeling. $16 for the hats and $20 for the shirts.

Cool sword/tanto week

Wow. It looks like we had an unofficial weapons week. The tanto arrived in the post to get us all excited and earlier in the week this wandered through the door. What a fun treat.

Now we get a lot of cool 'show and tell' at the shop, but this was one of the best. On Saturday afternoon this gentleman walked into the shop with a distinctive looking parcel. Out of the silk bag he drew a katana that his father picked up in the 1920's. It was old at that time. Now I am no sword expert, but I can tell you that the folded steel had that sexy look that old swords have, their was a small bit of tarnish including a very clear finger print and the hamon had a subtle, but poetic wave. All of the handle hardware was intact, but in fair condition. The saya was particularily good. All in all it was a special treat to see a very nice blade with all of the original hardware attached. It felt a bit like I was on Antiques Road Show and I was the specialist who was woefully under qualified.

I feel foolish that I didn't get his name. Thank you if you reading this.

160 year old Tanto in the post today

What a great day for post today. Shiba of Masakage knives has sent us this Tanto that I purchased on my recent visit to Japan.

The Tanto was most likely constructed as a Talisman for a girl of marrying age to give her strength in birth. It was made at the end of the Edo period, about 160 years ago. The blacksmith is unknown, but it was forged in the city of Fukusima just North of Tokyo.

The steel is in great condition, no mentionable tarnishing and the old folded/Damascus steel looks super cool. The Hamon is crisp and has a nice artistic wave. This is a great example of an 1850's tanto. SUPER SEXY and for only $2966.

Free Knife Sharpening - Donate to Haiti Relief Fund

We have all been affected by the bad news about the earthquake and the desperate situation in Haiti. Toru Tamura is volunteering his time to sharpen any knife purchased through Knifewear on Thursday 28 January for a donation to our Haiti Relief Fund.

All proceeds raised will be matched by Knifewear. In addition the Government of Canada will match all donations to the Canadian Red Cross. This means that every dollar we raise will turn into four dollars donated to the Canadian Red Cross for emergency and long term help for Haiti.

We look forward to seeing you.

http://www.redcross.ca/article.asp?id=000005&tid=003

As a side note Toru's last day at Knifewear will be Saturday 30 January. He is heading back to Japan and is planning to apprentice as a blacksmith, either for kitchen knives or maybe with Iwasaki, the famed straight razor blacksmith. Please pop into the shop to say good bye and good luck. He has been our knife sharpening secret weapon since August. We will miss you, Toru!

Knifewear is Hiring!!!!

We are looking for knife nuts (obviously) with personality who enjoy talking with customers. Knowledge or interest in knives, cooking , the Japanese language, or metallurgy would be beneficial. The desire to learn mandatory.

Our Calgary retail store has 2 positions available:

• full time retail sales person with some knife sharpening responsibilities

• full or part time knife sharpener with some sales responsibilities

All Knifewear employees receive an in depth knife sharpening apprenticeship in the Japanese knife sharpening style. We sharpen our knives by hand on waterstones, the most precise way and with the best results. Learn a dying art.

Knifewear staff enjoy a fun and professional working environment, a healthy discount on knives, and the love/admiration of chefs, foodies and knife nerds.

At Knifewear we sell the finest handmade Japanese kitchen knives. Most of our knives cannot be found in Canada, many of our knives are not seen outside of Japan. We work with 25+ Japanese knife makers who we consider the top in the world.

Be cool, become a Japanese knife expert at Knifewear.

Send resume and cover letter to info@knifewear.com