6 Attachment(s)
L.Kern & Zoon 7/8 Amsterdam
I was doubting whether to post this in show and tell, or here, but since I've had a nice day in the sun over the weekend working on this blade, I figured it would be okay here.
I found this blade on our local Bay. This was the state as it lay in the drawer waiting for attention for about two years now.
It came in its original box. A bit worn and torn, but still workable.
The oxidation luckily wasn't deep and only a microchip or two on the edge.
The pin near the tang had "eaten" into the horn scales, so I decided to unpin the blade and use only MicroMesh cloths. A bit of Neatsfoot oll on the scales, left there for a few hours while working on the blade.
Polished it all up to cloth 12000 and then set the razor back in its scales with washers this time. As the hole in the scales was too big for the pin that I had, I decided to fix it the old way, I'd figure our forefathers would do. Washer on the outside. Pretty? No. Effective? Yes.
I didn't need a masterpiece here and just wanted the blade to be free from oxidation, slightly polished and back in business.
I took a course Pierre D'Ardennes to get the microchipping out and followed up with the La Veinette for fast bevel setting. Then on to the smoother La Grosse Jaune to get to about 8K and finished off on the Nakayama Karasu. Borrowed a silver pen from my daughter to bring the lettering back a bit, but not overdone, so the box still looks worn/aged, but the letters are a bit more fresh and the side glued.
I'm happy with the result. The edge that this blade took reminds me of a Eugene Haring I once fixed for a friend of mine.
L.Kern and Son was a versatile shop on the Nieuwendijk 231 from 1830 till 1984. They sold barometers, orthopaedic equipment, pocket knives, straight razors, etc. Here's an ad from the papers of November 1894.
And an impression of the shop window in 1953. Like most, or nearly all of these knives and scissors shops, they didn't last.
I don't think they made razors themselves. On the back of the box it has the term "Stoomslijperij", which is steam-sharpening as the first steam engines made their way in to Amsterdam life in 1840. I can't find much more on the brand.
It was a nice sunny day and a welcome distraction from the locked-down world that we are in currently.
Hope you liked it. :)
