The knife you carry is the one you use a hundred times more than any other, usually for something dull. Build it around that, not around the photograph.
Most pocket knives are bought for how they look open and lived with for how they feel closed. Weight, thickness and how it opens matter far more day to day than the blade shape does. Work through the steps below in that order and you will end up with something you actually keep in your pocket.
1. Blade profile
A pocket knife opens boxes, cuts string and peels an apple. A wharncliffe does all three better than anything with a curve.
2. Handle style
The outline of the closed knife. Traditional patterns carry the look of the old slip joints, slim and contoured shapes ride flatter in a pocket.
3. Bolster style
Bolsters are the metal ends of the handle. They add strength around the pivot and a little weight in the hand.
4. Blade steel
A knife that lives in a pocket meets sweat and damp. If you carry it every day, stainless is the sensible answer.
5. Blade length
Carry length is set by where you live, so this is worth checking before you order.
6. Lock
A slip joint has no lock at all, which is what makes it legal to carry in a lot of places a locking knife is not.
7. How it opens
8. Handle scales
Cut, shaped and finished by hand, so the grain on yours will not exist on anyone else.
9. Bolster material
10. Pins and hardware
11. Pocket clip
12. Engraving
The reason a pocket knife gets handed down is usually the name on it.
13. Packaging
14. Leather Color
For any leather pouch included in your build.
15. How many?
Order 10 or more and a bulk discount is applied automatically.
16. Anything else (optional)
Ten or more - tell us what you need
Corporate gifts, groomsmen sets, restaurant kit. We quote by hand: unit price drops with volume and engraving is set up once for the whole run.
Cannot find it in the list? Design it yourself.
Pick a starting shape, move the sliders and watch the knife redraw with real measurements. Send it over and we quote it by hand.
Lock or slip joint
A slip joint has no lock at all. A spring holds it open and firm pressure closes it. That sounds like a disadvantage until you realise it is the reason a slip joint is legal to carry in a great many places where a locking knife is not. For opening parcels, cutting string and everything else a pocket knife genuinely does, it is entirely sufficient.
A liner or frame lock lets you close the knife one handed and takes force on the spine without folding. If you use a knife at work rather than around the house, take the lock.
The blade shape nobody picks and everybody should
A wharncliffe has a completely straight edge and a spine that drops to meet it. Because the edge never curves, the whole length of it stays in contact with whatever you are cutting, and the tip is exactly where you are pointing. Boxes, cord, tape, a stubborn seam: it beats a drop point at all of them. It looks strange in a photograph, which is the only reason it is not the default.
What we would build
A three inch wharncliffe in 440C, slip joint, nail nick, buffalo horn scales with brass bolsters and brass pins. It disappears in a pocket, it is legal almost everywhere, it costs under two hundred dollars, and it is the sort of knife that ends up with somebody else in fifty years.
Questions people ask first
How stiff is the action when it arrives?
Set to a firm middle by hand. If you want a lighter pull for arthritic hands or a heavier one for pocket safety, say so in the notes and we tune it before it ships.
Can I have the clip on the left?
Yes, no extra charge, just tell us in the notes.
Will bone and horn scales crack?
Not in normal use. Both are stabilised before they are cut. What harms them is being left somewhere hot and bone dry for months, like a car dashboard in summer.
Which steel for genuine every day carry?
440C stainless. A carried knife meets sweat and rain and gets forgotten in a pocket, and carbon steel will show that. If you want carbon anyway, wipe it and it will be fine.
What blade length should I choose?
Carry length is set by where you live, so check that first. Where you are free to choose, three inches does everything and disappears in a pocket.
Please check your local law before ordering.
- You uploadUp to 5 pictures and your instructions.
- You pay $50A refundable deposit. It puts your brief in the queue.
- We quoteA written price, steel, size and lead time, inside two working days.
- You decideGo ahead and the $50 comes off. Say no and it is refunded.
- It is a review deposit, not a payment for a knife. Nothing is ordered yet.
- If you approve our quote, the full $50 is taken off the price of the build.
- If we cannot agree on price, or we do not think we can make it properly, or you simply change your mind, it is refunded in full to the card you paid with.
- We will not copy another maker’s trademarked design or anything we are not allowed to forge. If that is what the picture shows, we will say so and refund you.
Your pictures are only ever seen by our shop. Please check your local law before ordering.
