Gembloux knife show 2017

[Bruno]

Not really related to razors, but I spent the weekend at the knifeshow in gembloux. together with US and UK knifemakers I stayed in an old farmhouse / manor. It's a group of good friends and talented smiths. during that weekend, we eat, cook and drink together, and go hang out at the show. My main reasons for going there are to hang out with friends, and to buy interesting materials.

I'll post some pics of the weekend. I actually forgot to take some wide area pics of the meet, and there are a bunch of pics I won't share because it has other people in them after consuming copious amounts of alcohol. Still, some pics are good to share.

This is the manor where our group was staying.


A handful of us during the first evening. Laughter and fun among friends.


Fukushima spider, forged by living legend Doc Price


The horn of the spider is a knife. The spyderco trademark hole is a joke, for the fact the it is a spider, and it was a gift for Ed Schempp who is a designer for spyderco.


The man himself: Doc Price

[Bruno]

Breakfast


Swords at the breakfast table. Everything you see here is complex damascus


And if you know me a bit, you know that my daughters insist that any trip I undertake should involve stuffed animals. So I had Mr. Bear and the nose-o-saurus with me

[Bruno]

And now the stuff I bought.

Borax. Nothing special, but I was out and this way I did not have to pay shipping


A piece of mammoth tusk from the scrap bin of a handle material seller. I love searching the bin for things that I can use. This is a lot cheaper than the good stuff. And if you have something in mind you want to make, you can see if anything fits with what you may want. In this case, the ivory has a crack. But the piece is otherwise dead straight, which is rare-ish. So if I cut where it is cracked, I have 2 pieces that are big and straight enough for knife scales.



Scraps of giraffe bone


Stabilized mammoth molar. Big enough for bolsters.


Not from the scrap bin. Top to bottom: a piece of fossilized stellers sea cow bone. A piece of stabilized mammoth rib, and a piece of stabilized oosik. All knife handle sized. The oosik was an impulse buy. I want to make a stainless Damascus kitchen knife for myself, and with this curve, this is exactly the handle shape I want. I will have to do absolutely nothing to it other than drill a hole for the tang.



A jewelers saw. Charlie Lewis taught me it is the best thing for making tang holes in guards of bolsters.

[Bruno]

And finally some steel. The top piece is a big bar of Bob Kramer's crucible steel which I got from Ed Schempp with the request to review it. The second piece is a decent piece of 100 layer Damascus. The third piece came from the pile of discounted ends. I'm going to cut it up and use it as Damascus layers in a new billet. And the last piece is an end piece of stainless Damascus that is thick enough to forge (most is just flat). I am going to make myself a new knife for the kitchen, and I want it to be stainless because my wife is not a knife person. Typically this stainless damast is pretty expensive but I got a decent price because the guy looked in the wrong table and sold it too cheaply. His colleague intervened when I had already paid and pointed the guy to the right table, resulting in a hearty 'fuck'. but I'd already paid and his colleague said to leave it. a deal's a deal.

[32t]

Looks like a great time!

I look forward to your products from these materials.

[Butzy]

can't wait to see what you make out of all that Damascus!