Chef 210
6 of 22- Steel
- 26C3 mono
- Edge
- 63.5 HRC
- Grind
- Full flat
- Behind edge
- 0.20 mm
- Weight
- 178 g
- Handle
- Bog oak, brass pin
The workhorse. Tall enough to knuckle-clear, thin enough to fall through an onion.
€ 360
A two-person forge · Trondheim, Norway
Two smiths.
One fire.
Twenty-two knives this autumn.
We make kitchen knives twice a year, in batches small enough that every blade gets both of us. Batch 27 opens for claiming on 12 October. The waitlist gets first strike.
BATCH 27 · AUTUMN 2026
22 BLADES · 6 LINES
FORGE-WELDED SEP 03–14
GROUND SEP 21 – OCT 02
CLAIM OPENS OCT 12 · 06:00
WAITLIST FIRST · 48 H
01 · The autumn batch
What the fire gave us
Twenty-two blades, six lines, two steels and one damascus. Each knife is forged, ground, tempered and handled here — no blanks, no contract grinding. Weights are the finished knife, to the gram.
Chef 210 · Damascus
4 of 22- Steel
- 256-layer 1084/15N20
- Core
- 26C3 san-mai
- Edge
- 63 HRC
- Behind edge
- 0.22 mm
- Weight
- 184 g
- Handle
- Oiled walnut
Same geometry as the plain chef. The pattern is the fold, not a print — see below.
€ 560
Slicer 255
3 of 22- Steel
- 52100
- Edge
- 61 HRC
- Grind
- Convex
- Behind edge
- 0.25 mm
- Weight
- 158 g
- Handle
- Smoked ash
Long, narrow, a little springy. Sunday roasts, gravlax, brisket if you must.
€ 395
Santoku 175
4 of 22- Steel
- 26C3 mono
- Edge
- 63.5 HRC
- Grind
- Full flat
- Behind edge
- 0.18 mm
- Weight
- 152 g
- Handle
- Bog oak, brass pin
For small kitchens and people who chop more than they rock.
€ 330
Petty 135
3 of 22- Steel
- 52100
- Edge
- 62 HRC
- Grind
- Full flat
- Behind edge
- 0.15 mm
- Weight
- 74 g
- Handle
- Smoked ash
The knife that ends up doing half the cooking. Shallots, trimming, board work.
€ 240
Paring 90
2 of 22- Steel
- 52100
- Edge
- 62 HRC
- Grind
- Full flat
- Behind edge
- 0.12 mm
- Weight
- 48 g
- Handle
- Bog oak
In-hand work. Two in the batch because we only had two blocks of oak left worth it.
€ 190
Blade 27-09
Off the strop, before breakfast
This is the fourth damascus chef of the batch: 1084 and 15N20 folded seven times over a 26C3 core, etched in ferric chloride, handle in walnut from a felled tree on Ingrid's uncle's farm. Photographed the morning it came off the strop, on the bench where it was made.
Every blade in the batch carries a number like this one — batch, then position. It's stamped under the handle scale where you'll never see it. We'll know it anyway.
FORGED — M. BERGE · GROUND — I. HALVARD
02 · The tempering bench
Read the steel by its colour
Hardness is easy — a file-hard blade holds a vicious edge and snaps in a drawer. Tempering trades a little hardness back for toughness, and clean steel tells you where you are: the oxide skin changes colour with temperature. Drag the bar.
DRAG THE BAR — OR USE ARROW KEYS
We temper every kitchen blade twice at 200 °C, two hours each — pale straw, both times. Past 250 °C the edge gets forgiving and soft; past 300 °C you've made a nice spring and a poor knife. Spring steel, incidentally, is where the blue range earns its living.
03 · Damascus, honestly
Seven folds. 256 layers.
We stack bright 15N20 against dark 1084, weld the billet in the fire, draw it out, cut it, and fold it back on itself. Every fold doubles the count. The pattern isn't printed or etched on — it's the geometry of the fold, made visible in acid.
FOLD 0 · 2 LAYERS
THE FIRST STACK
04 · Care
The ritual is short
Carbon steel asks four things of you. In exchange it takes an edge stainless never will, and it goes grey-blue with your cooking — a patina, not a flaw.
- R1
Wipe as you cook
Acid sits, steel marks. A pass with a dry cloth between tasks is the whole discipline.
- R2
No dishwasher. Ever.
Hot water, a drop of soap, dry immediately. The dishwasher voids nothing — we'll still fix it — but we will know.
- R3
Strop weekly
Twenty passes on loaded leather keeps the edge off the stones for months. A strop ships with every knife.
- R4
Oil before resting
Going away for a week? One drop of camellia oil, spread with a thumb. That's it.
If an edge chips or wanders, send it back. We regrind for the life of the blade — postage on us, turnaround a fortnight, no small print.
05 · The waitlist
Take a tag
The waitlist isn't a hype queue — it's how a two-person forge sells forty-four knives a year without a warehouse. When claiming opens on 12 October, the list gets the batch 48 hours before anyone else, in strict order.
No deposit. No obligation. If nothing in the batch suits you, your place carries to spring.