My Knife Buying Adventures in Tokyo

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I spent a little over a week in Tokyo in late October and early November. Naturally, buying knives was a primary goal. While what I came back with may not be what others here would seek out, they fit my current needs.
I started on the restaurant supply street of Kappabashi. For those that haven't been there, it seems like the most common businesses are cutlery stores. I didn't keep count but I would guess around several dozen. My first stop was a shop offering Sugimoto cleavers where the owner was willing to lay out everything between the number 1 through number 7. I have a 7 and its a heavy beast for serious chopping. I wanted to actually hold a number 6 as well as the others sizes. It didn't take me long to decide I needed the number 6. That was followed by a stop in another shop where the owner went in the back to pull out all his left handed Honesuki (they weren't on display), Here I settled on a 150mm Misono. I just like the grind better on this one.

Naturally I made two trips to the old Tsukiji fish market. While there are a lot of knife shops this can be a very crowded place. Many of the shops seemed to be primarily trying to push Damascus clad santoku to tourists. My second trip back was to hunt down three shops in partiular, Masamoto, Aritsugu and the main Sugimoto location. At Masamoto I bought a carbon 240mm gyuto and a stubby carbon 100mm Honesuki. I like short Honesuki but have not been happy with the steel of the one I have.

Aritsugu was a friendly shop but I didn't find anything I really needed there.

Sugimoto was a completely different experience. They had a table out front displaying tourist knives, santoku, short gyuto, petty's etc. Inside the shop both walls were lined with glass display cases of what I considered more interesting cutlery. I would have kind of liked to have a Sugimoto gyuto. A few inches inside on the left was a display of their famous cleavers. The problem was the second I stepped past the doorway to look at the cleavers a Japanese lady descended on me like a hawk demanding I leave the shop. Something about they did not allow anyone inside the shop. So what, I'm supposed to do stand in the street and shout which knife I want to buy without handling it? All I can say is she seemed very angry I would even think of entering. Maybe she had decided I wasn't a serious customer and was not worth her respect. I certainly would not go back!

There were also a number of sharpening stones I would have liked but those are just too heavy for my luggage.

For the most part, I accomplshed my knife buying goals there though.
 
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Getting chased out of a store for no discernible reason by a person yelling at you in a foreign language is pretty epic. I’d definitely trade buying a knife for that experience 🤣
 
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My first use for my new Sug. No. 6 was making Enchiladas. Slice, diced and chopped a large skillet full of onions, chicken and peppers for ingredients. I'm very happy with its performance so far.
 
Yet another chapter to this saga. Given I never got into the Sugimoto store, I went ahead and ordered a 210mm carbon gyuto off a web vendor in Japan. The web site said this knife was ground "double edge" but when it arrived I found it had a very right hand biased asymmetrical grind. I'm left handed. As far as I'm concerned gyuto should be ambidextrous. So you may see this one show up on buy sell trade very soon.
 
Would you hazard a guess as to whether better value is available in Tokyo as opposed to internet sites (for the same or sililar products)?
 
Would you hazard a guess as to whether better value is available in Tokyo as opposed to internet sites (for the same or sililar products)?
Not having been able to even enter their shop I have no idea what they were charging. Of course, it doesn't take too much math skills to decide buying off the web is cheaper than a trip to Japan. :)
 
Thanks, Noodle Soup, but my question was addressed to your experience with buying knives in other places than the shop where you were refused admission.

Also, I know that the cost of a trip to Japan is expensive but if you travel to Japan for other reasons than buyng knives (i.e. if you're there anyway) would you consider that knife purchases are good value relative to what one might pay online.

Thanks.
 
Thanks, Noodle Soup, but my question was addressed to your experience with buying knives in other places than the shop where you were refused admission.

Also, I know that the cost of a trip to Japan is expensive but if you travel to Japan for other reasons than buyng knives (i.e. if you're there anyway) would you consider that knife purchases are good value relative to what one might pay online.

Thanks.
I really don't know if I could have gotten better deals on the net. but that is usually how it works these days. Sales taxes are high in Japan. One shop used my passport to deduct that but the other two I bought at did not. I did check off a number of other places I wanted to visit. Museums, gardens etc.
 
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