Looking for Western Maker Recommendations

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nhb22

KKF Supporting Member
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My KKF Fridends,

After buying and trying more than 40 knives made by Japanese makers, I acquired my first knife made by a western maker - a Newham 52100 from Will. I like it a lot so far. I have also preordered a 52100 gyuto from Jonas at Isasmedjan. I want to try more knives by western makers and want to start a short list / roadmap for this year. Would you guys be so kind and tell me what the next 5-10 knives I should try? eg., maker and steel (western makers only)
 
It really depends what you’re looking for or what you like.

Thin concave? Thin convex? Midweight? Workhorse? S-grind? Integral? Wa, Western, or semi-Western handle? Clad or mono? Price range?

If you don’t specify you’ll end up with a list of 100 makers with no idea how they compare.

All of that said, I think Birgersson is an excellent first non-Japanese maker for both reasonable price range, outstanding cutting ability, reasonable availability (but getting harder), and durable build.
 
Thor Behold GIF by Truly.
 
nhb22 said:
My KKF Fridends,

After buying and trying more than 40 knives made by Japanese makers, I acquired my first knife made by a western maker - a Newham 52100 from Will. I like it a lot so far. I have also preordered a 52100 gyuto from Jonas at Isasmedjan. I want to try more knives by western makers and want to start a short list / roadmap for this year. Would you guys be so kind and tell me what the next 5-10 knives I should try? eg., maker and steel (western makers only)
Click to expand...

For Western makers, I love knives by the following:
Yanick Puig
Bryan Raquin
Tsourkan (NY based)
Shihan
Kippington
Isasmedjan
Birgersson
Simon Maillet
 
@nhb22 - all of the above recommendations are solid. I agree with the recommendations that you should narrow down on what you like and then select 5-10 makers. Thinking through laser vs. midweight vs. workhorse, profile preferences (gyuto vs western, etc.), and handle preferences (western vs wa vs other) will do wonders to narrow the list, and then think through steel preferences. Stainless vs. carbon, damascus, san mai, etc. Thankfully, we live in a time when there are 100 makers out there who are doing work that is absolutely rock solid.
 
Thank you so much to everyone who replied and offered advice and sorry about the super open ended question. I’m very open-minded. Kitchen knife is a hobby, so I don’t have any hard requirements. When I first started trying Japanese knives, I remember someone told me I need to try different grinds, steels, makers and knives from different region. If someone new to Japanese makers asks me the first 5 knives to try, I might recommend something like:

1. Toyama 240mm blue 2 gyuto
2. TF Mab 240mm gyuto
3. Takada 240mm blue 1 gyuto
4. Wakui w2 workhorse
5. Nakagawa 240mm ginsan gyuto or maybe a Yoshikane SKD

Obviously, I imagine everyone’s list would be different, but you get the idea. Would you guys be able to give me a list of 5-10? When you recommend a maker, it would be helpful if you can also specify the steel you think I should try. If someone does a unique grind or shape that you can recommend, it would be good to specify that as well. Knives from certain makers (for example, Milan) seem very hard to acquire, it would good to keep those recommendations to 1 out of 5 or 2 out of 10. For the first 5, I would like to keep 3 below $1k, 1 below $1500 and 1 below $2,500. If you have 10 knives you can recommend, please just multiply those numbers by 2.

Again, really appreciate you guys’ input!
 
Delat said:
It really depends what you’re looking for or what you like.

Thin concave? Thin convex? Midweight? Workhorse? S-grind? Integral? Wa, Western, or semi-Western handle? Clad or mono? Price range?

If you don’t specify you’ll end up with a list of 100 makers with no idea how they compare.

All of that said, I think Birgersson is an excellent first non-Japanese maker for both reasonable price range, outstanding cutting ability, reasonable availability (but getting harder), and durable build.
Click to expand...
Totally agree. I should’ve narrowed my question down a bit…I just added some additional explanation above. Thanks for the Birgersson recommendation!
 
jedy617 said:
Besides the ones listed...yanick, milan, evan, kamon, tansu, the.9ine...there are just so many
Click to expand...
Thinking I probably need to start with knives that are easier to acquire. I definitely want to try Yanick, Milan and the.9ine. Also, I only want to try one knife about $1500 in my first 5. I have to be very selective. Evan and Kamon both seem pretty expensive…thoughts?
 
labor of love said:
IG is your guide to exploring western makers for the most part. Follow all the before mentioned makers and more then figure what knives appeal to you the most.
Click to expand...

I already follow some of the western makers, but I don’t really know how to use IG to figure out which knives I should buy and try. Do I just look at the cosmetics and the measurements?
 
Like many on KKF, I probably have too many knives and continue buying. My Birgerssons remain as my daily drivers, but Shihan and Bloodroot are out frequently too.
Good advice above to narrow down your preferences to steel, geometry, size, handle, etc,
nhb22 said:
Totally agree. I should’ve narrowed my question down a bit…I just added some additional explanation above. Thanks for the Birgersson recommendation!
Click to expand...
 
I'd recommend spending some time with the search function here. It takes some time to read through threads, and there's some fluff that needs to be filtered (understatement) but you'll be able to find some common themes. For instance, Shihan's grind and treatment of A2 has been consistently and universally well regarded for a number of years. Likewise with Kippington's 52100. Independent experience as documented in these archives makes for safe bets, so to speak, but you do have to put some time in.
 
Yes unicorn chasing is kind of hard if you can't put in the time to hard chase some of the above.

Msicard, Eddworks and Blank Blade come to mind that's on this side of ocean and are active on site at least...

Also, it seems no one gave steel recommendations. PM steels of any sort (CPM-D2, CPM-M4) are very cool to try (both makers above could make something cool with these steels). Newer steels like Apex Ultra and Magnacut are also great for knives that you kind of planning of keeping for a really long time. I won't go into the detail of said steels on a post as you probs can read Larrin's work for a much better idea of these. Purchase if you'd like to see what it feels like.

The 68 HRC CPM-M4 basically has a BNIB edge after a few months of usage as home cook... even with a lot of tomatos in my cooking rotation... I've been itching to put one on the stones, but the edge won't go anywhere...

Also something you could try is a S Grind... like a deeeeeep one.

nhb22 said:
Thinking I probably need to start with knives that are easier to acquire. I definitely want to try Yanick, Milan and the.9ine. Also, I only want to try one knife about $1500 in my first 5. I have to be very selective. Evan and Kamon both seem pretty expensive…thoughts?
Click to expand...
I'm not a fan of triangles and very WH oriented so I went with a Evan. Excellent workhorse with walkschliff, definitely makes holding and looking at one feel super special.
 
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