Bluegrain Hand Forged Damascus Folding Pocket Knife with Blue Hardwood Handle & Cowhide Leather Sheath | Gentlemans Everyday Carry Gift | RK-382

Blue is not a colour steel gives you, so the Bluegrain takes it from the handle instead. Blue hardwood scales against a hand forged Damascus blade, 6.5 inches open on a 2.75 inch edge, with brass file work cut along the spine. Six ounces in the pocket, forged and ground by one pair of hands, and the edge is set before it is packed.

Small knives are the oldest tools we have any personal record of. When the body known as the Iceman came out of a glacier on the Italian and Austrian border in 1991, having lain there for around 5,300 years, one of the objects still with him was a knife: a short flint blade about two and a half inches long, set into a split ash handle and bound with plant fibre. It was not a fighting knife and it was not ceremonial. Wear analysis showed it was the tool he had used most. The dimensions of a knife a person carries every day have barely moved in five millennia, because they are set by the size of a human hand and by the size of the jobs a day actually contains.

Forged and finished in the Czech Republic. It ships with a cowhide leather sheath, protective packaging and a working edge.

Specifications

Why a short blade does more work than people expect

There is a persistent idea that a bigger blade is a more capable blade. For everyday cutting the opposite is usually true, and the reason is force per inch. When you push a knife through something, the effort you apply is spread along however much edge is in contact. A 2.75 inch edge concentrates the same hand pressure into a shorter run of steel, so it starts a cut more easily and needs less muscle to keep it moving through cardboard, cord, tape or a tough rind.

Control is the other half. The tip of a short blade sits close to your hand, which means small movements at the wrist translate into small, predictable movements at the point. On a long blade the same wrist movement is multiplied and the tip wanders. That is why every trade that cuts precisely, from cobblers to surgeons, works with a short blade. What you lose is reach and slicing length, so a 2.75 inch folder is a poor choice for carving a roast or breaking down a large animal, and an excellent one for the two dozen small cuts a normal day contains. The brass jimping along the spine matters more at this size than it does on a big knife, because at short range you steer with your thumb.

Why Damascus and not stainless

Damascus here means 1095 and 15N20 forge welded into a single billet, folded, drawn out and etched so the layers show. It is a structural pattern, not a print, and it will still be there when the blade has been sharpened for twenty years. At 58 to 60 HRC it gives a harder edge and a longer working life than the soft stainless used in most factory folders.

The cost is a wipe of oil now and then. Carbon steel will spot if it is left wet and it will darken into a patina with use, which is protective rather than harmful. Stainless forgives neglect but does not take the same edge and cannot carry a pattern through the steel. If you want a knife you can throw in a wet tackle box and ignore for a year, buy stainless; if you want the better edge and are willing to spend a minute a week, buy this. We set the trade out plainly in Damascus versus stainless.

The blue hardwood handle

The scales are blue hardwood, cut, shaped and polished by hand and pinned through the liners. The colour sits into the grain rather than on top of it, so the figure of the timber still reads through the blue and the depth changes as you turn the knife in the light. Every scale comes from a different part of a different board, which means the pattern of light and dark, the tightness of the grain and the exact shade all move from one knife to the next.

Wood is the oldest handle material there is and it is still the most comfortable in cold weather, because it does not draw heat out of your palm the way metal does. It is finished in oil rather than lacquer so it can be maintained at home. A light wipe of mineral oil once or twice a year keeps it from drying and shrinking away from the pins, and it should be kept out of long soaks and away from direct heat. The routine is in wooden handle care.

Engraving, runes and your own design

Use the rune converter on this page to turn a name, a date or a short phrase into Elder Futhark and we will cut it into the steel or the handle. If you would rather have a Viking pattern than a rune line, choose your own design in the engraving option above the add to cart button and tell us whether it goes on the blade or the handle. Where a piece already carries an engraved design, your chosen engraving replaces it rather than sitting alongside it. On a blade this size a short rune line or a set of initials reads better than a long phrase, and we will tell you honestly if what you have asked for will not fit legibly. See the engraving page.

Care and sharpening

A minute after use is all it asks. Wipe the blade dry, particularly after fruit, onion or anything salty, and put a thin film of mineral or camellia oil on the steel before storage. Put a drop of light oil into the pivot two or three times a year and work the blade to spread it, which keeps the action smooth and lifts grit out of the joint.

Sharpening is ordinary stone work. A 1000 grit stone raises a burr on a blade this small in a couple of minutes and a 3000 refines it; keep to the angle already on the edge rather than reprofiling. Leather holds moisture, so store the knife out of the sheath for long periods rather than in it. Both jobs are covered in steel care and sharpening with a whetstone.

Made in the Czech Republic

This is a handmade piece from the Czech Republic, made in a workshop that still forges, grinds and finishes by hand instead of stamping parts out. The smiths there have kept the older way of working, and the wood, horn and leather are shaped and fitted by hand as well. Two pieces of the same design will never be identical, and that is part of what you are buying.

Ransack Viking is a United States company. We handle the import ourselves, look over every piece when it lands and ship from our warehouse in Memphis, Tennessee. Engraving is done in the United States after the piece arrives, so your design goes on before we send it out.

A note on handmade variation

The Bluegrain is hand forged, not machine made and not bulk produced, so what arrives will not be a pixel for pixel copy of the photograph on this page. Dyed timber is particularly variable: the same colour lands differently on tight grain than on open grain, so one handle can read as deep navy and another as a lighter, more mottled blue. The Damascus pattern comes out of the billet differently every time and the file work is cut by eye.

The dimensions, the steel, the hardness and the build are identical from one knife to the next. The character is not, because each one is worked by hand from natural materials.

Frequently asked questions

Is the blue colour painted on

No. It is taken into the timber rather than laid on the surface, which is why the grain still shows through it. A painted finish would chip at the edges and this does not.

Will the colour fade in sunlight

Prolonged direct sun will lighten any dyed timber over years, in the same way it fades a wooden floor. Normal pocket carry does not, and keeping the knife out of a sunny windowsill is enough.

Is this a one handed opening knife

It opens with the nail nick using two hands, in the traditional manner. There is no thumb stud and no flipper. That is deliberate on a slip joint pattern of this size.

Can two be engraved differently for a matching pair

Yes. Order the quantity you need and send the separate engraving text for each. Matched pairs and small sets for wedding parties are routine work here.

What is the file work along the spine doing

It is thumb purchase as well as decoration. The filed brass gives your thumb a positive place to sit under pressure, and brass is soft enough not to dig in the way sharpened steel jimping would.

Does the price include the sheath

Yes. The cowhide leather sheath is included and it is cut and stitched to the finished knife, not to a generic pattern. US shipping is free on top of that.

What is in the box

• One Bluegrain Damascus folding pocket knife
• Cowhide leather sheath
• Protective packaging
• Care notes for carbon steel and oiled timber
• Forged and finished in the Czech Republic

Explore the range

See the rest of the folding pocket knives, the Viking knives and the Damascus skinner knives if you want a fixed blade instead. The reasoning behind steels and handles sits in the guides.