Thread: Werner Breidenbach – the Grand Old Master of straight razor grinding in Solingen

Peter, this is not helping my razor acquisition problem at all.

You show some beautiful razors.

Sorry for that David!
I personally never had any acquisition problems when it came to beautiful razors.
Only some funds problems sometimes :
or problems with my wife acceptance maybe

Simply amazing.

In recent times Werner Breidenbach made razors with his own name on them, including 70 blades in various widths to celebrate his 70 years of grinding. For example the 7/8 Dreifuss below, finished on a Thuringian. Werner is well into his 80s so you'd be forgiven for thinking these might be his last blades but he seems unstoppable so hopefully we'll continue to see further full hollows from him.

I also have the DVD, which is a fascinating but relatively short overview on Solingen razor making (considering the complexity and skills needed). And Breidenbach works so fast I had to constantly stop the disc to try and see exactly what he was doing - so only one thing to do, petition Breidenbach for some longer tutorials!

Thank you so much for this historic information about Solingen's Werner Breidenbach. I was especially interested in his connection with Juan Vollmer and the infamous Palmera 14 razor. (I am the proud owner of three Palmera 14s.) I have found very little information on line about the Palmera and found this very interesting. Thanks again Hatzicho!

Some very nice eye-candy for Christmas

The following razors are a special class of straights.
Ground by Werner Breidenbach.
A special limited edition – produced for the most famous of all scissor makers in Solingen – Hans Wilhelm Böker.
Made from a very special steel – damascus. But not simply damascus steel. Stainless damascus. The first real stainless damascus steel in Germany that was able to serve as knife and razor steel – develloped by the famous knifesmith Friedrich Schneider in 1982.





Unique masterpiece, produced for Puma. Scales from ivory with damascus plates.



Perfect looking texture of the stainless Schneider-Damast.



Form me personally I normally don’t like razors made from damascus steel because you often don’t get the edges really sharp enough and smooth.
Not so these blades! Absolutely perfect edge, not a cent behind a really great carbon blade or a stainless Henckels Friodur.
An absolut pleasure not only to look at -but also to shave with!




A nice christmas and happy new year to everybody!
Peter

Werner Breidenbach in 2022....
Still producing straight razors!



Still creating masterpieces of fine handwork:




In a few weeks he is getting 89 years.



74 years of razor grinding! Simply unbelievable.

Regards Peter

That blade is so thin it’s hard to imagine it was ground by hand let alone by someone who is almost 90.

Beautiful piece of work by a legendary craftsman.

Yeah as said before it is simply amazing and inspiring to watch him at work. The eyes may not be the best anymore from time to time but the fingers do exactly the work like more than 70 years now without any trembling and hesitation.

When I sit sometimes next to him asking, well how can I improve my technique, I am not satisfied with my results. He simply takes the razor blanket, saying „Oh that’s easy…“ and than making one simple movement, showing me a perfect result afterwards. And you think by yourself, yeah man - that is easy. And than your are doing the same thing – you think you are doing the same – but the result is totally different. And you remember the masters words: Razor grinding is not an easy thing to learn and to do. You need experience, experience and much more experience. Beside the correct technique.

Hopefully his health allows him to go on with grinding some more years…!

Stay sharp
Peter

A very special Werner Breidenbach. Made from an old blanket of Carl Friedrich Ern.



Carl Friedrich Ern was a dazzling figure in the Solingen industrial landscape. He was the one who brought the Solingen razor industry through to its heyday. He mainly achieved this by dividing the manufacturing process into individual work steps. At the same time he introduced the double hollow grinding machines. So it was possible to significantly enhanche efficiency and thus greatly increase the number of pieces produced. This also largely eliminated the need for absolute grinding specialists, as many of the activities could be performed by much cheaper temporary workers. Of course, the old razor grinders, who had to be well paid, ran up a storm against this.

The fact that just now one of the old ERN blankets was ground by an absolute master and all the individual steps in the manufacture were carried out by Werner Breidenbach himself, makes the razor a very special one.



Stay sharp!
Peter