Amethyst Tide Handmade 14C28N Steel Wharncliffe Ladies Folding Knife | Violet Resin Handle | Liner Lock EDC with White Leather Pouch | BMK-1219

Description

Most small folders are sold on color and finished on cost. The Amethyst Tide is the other way around. The violet resin is genuinely striking, poured and swirled so pale silver clouds move through a deep amethyst ground, but underneath it is a properly built liner lock: steel liners, a phosphor bronze washer on each side of the pivot, blue anodized screws that come out with a driver, and a titanium clip that has been anodized to the same blue.

The blade

A modified wharncliffe, which means a straight edge and a spine that drops in a shallow line to a low point. There is a flat, blunt-cornered tip left at the front rather than a needle, which is deliberate: it survives being used as a scraper and it does not snap when it slips. The steel is 14C28N, stonewashed to a soft mottled grey.

That alloy is worth a word. It is a nitrogen-alloyed stainless with a very fine grain, which is what lets it take a thin, aggressive edge without chipping. It is also forgiving to sharpen; ten passes per side on a ceramic rod will bring back a working edge, and a proper reset on a stone takes minutes rather than an evening.

In the hand

The handle is short but the frame is contoured, and there is a finger relief where the blade tang meets the scales so your index finger sits in a natural pocket. That single detail is what stops a small knife from feeling like a keyring toy. The thumb stud sits proud enough to catch without hunting for it, and there is no spring assist, so the knife opens exactly as fast as you move.

Ground bevels are taken high on the blade. If you want to know why that changes how a knife cuts, we cover the options in our explanation of folding knife bevels.

Carrying it legally

A three-inch manual folder is legal to carry in most of the United States, but blade-length limits, lock rules and city ordinances vary a lot. Before you put it in a pocket for a trip, check the state-by-state summary of pocket knife law. It takes two minutes and it is worth doing properly.

Who buys this one

People who want a small folder that does not look like the one everybody else is carrying, and people buying a first proper pocket knife for someone who will actually use it. It handles parcels, packaging, garden ties, loose threads, fruit at a desk and the hundred small cutting jobs a day contains. It is not a pry bar and it is not a survival tool, and we would rather say so.

Made in Memphis, kept simple

Blades are ground, heat treated and finished in our own shop in Tennessee, and each knife is assembled and sharpened by one person before it goes into its hand-stitched white leather slip pouch.

Care is minimal because the steel is stainless and the resin is inert. Wipe it, keep grit out of the pivot, add a drop of light oil there now and then, and check the body screws are snug a few times a year. Body screws back out with an ordinary hex driver, so if the action ever feels gritty you can strip it, wash the parts, dry them and put it back together on a kitchen table in ten minutes. That is a deliberate design choice; a knife that cannot be opened cannot be maintained. The matching fixed blade in the same poured violet is the Violet Hour.

Model: BMK-1219