Matthew Parkinson

well when I posted this I was wondering what it would do to the craft world and small business in general. I still don't have a answer long term but I have seen some things start to settle out. 1 classes are stopped for the next several weeks to months, that is putting a financial strain on many for certain. 2 shows are not happen until at least Aug world wide, again some financial strain. Most of the makers I have talked to are expecting a boom after this settles down, I think that might be wishful thinking. I see a winnowing coming there will be a lot of work on the market, some pent up demand and very little in the way of opportunities for sales, I am not sure large shows will be possible until a covid-19 is reduced to the danger of the flu or less, that could be through medical intervention or some other means. I see marketing and building a brand as being far and away more importing to the health of businesses than ever before. Damasteel has pushed the invitational in May online. early plans look like a website with each maker having a "table" each having photos of available knives and a live steam with the maker that each customer can speak with them. It is kind of cool and could be great, or fail miserably. I feel like in that market (high end kitchen knives mostly) this sort of thing will have a higher chance of work , in general this customer base seems to be younger and more tech savy than a lot of the hunter/bowie collectors. I have been working on a couple of projects, including some video stuff that may help me with this sort of thing , but really I need to make a plan and start working toward it. such is life. MP

SO it is looking to me like online is going to the only sales for the foreseeable future. I am still getting inquires for customs and am still selling online ( need to ship a knife tomorrow in fact). as long as there is income out there custom makers will get a piece of it, just a questing if that piece will be big enough to live off. I was going to be running the "sharps" tent at the ABANA conference. the other demonstrators and I have talked about trying to find a way to do our demos online, I may even record the lecture I was going to give. I have heard that ABANA is looking at putting a web site together for something along the same lines , but Jeff Lin and I were just talking about live streaming it on youtube.. For me I think if I can get to the shop (not all that sure a thing right now) Ill work on some stock items then start on an MS test set. we are living in interesting times..

I was just finishing up my column for May Knife Magazine, I was talking about how the knife market is so robust, how there are many sectors and redundancy with in it.. little did I know that all of that would change in a week and who knows if it will ever go back the way it was.What to do in this new business environment? That is the big thing on my mind over the last week or so. Even more so as travel restrictions and soft quarantines close shows , cancel classes and paid demos I was counting on for income.All in all I am OK I have some orders that haven't been canceled and I am still getting inquiries on customs, my wife hasn't lost her income or worse our insurance nor is she likely to. We may go on rice an beans and get behind on some things, but mostly we will be Ok. but n the business side I am worried about losing momentum, about the market dieing on the vine in general.I could use some perspective on this, as I re-write that column.What is every ones plan? fears? hopes? what does this look like to you?what can shows/conferences/schools do to help your planing, or to get you through?would an Online knife show help fill the gaps? online hammer-in?what do you think? MP

I don't know if any one reads Knife magazine on here , but i started writing a every other month column for them last June, because i wasn't busy enough in my life I pitched the column as something like what was written by Godard or folwer back in the old days but with current information. Mostly technical advice mixed with a bit of opinion and hopefully a bit of wisdom as well. So far is seems to be going well, but I have been slightly disappointed in that I am not getting as many questions as i had hoped, or really much in the way of feed back at all. So I figured i would posting here. Any one got any questions for me? MP

For many years now I was business partners with Peter Swarz-Burt and watched him making wootz . I learned a ton from him over the years. Well Peter left the shop last June,moved to HI infact. After peter left I got an order for a wootz knife . There were a few bars laying around I could use so I took the job.. the bars failed .. so I began my dissent into wootz making . This is the first piece completed from My wootz

I first learned this technique in this thread by Peter Johnsson with some needed correction in the two classes I have taken with Peter. I was looking back and it's hard to believe that that was almost 10 years ago. Looking back there was a LOT of just amazing things happening then... Also I got the coop photo back.. so much better than my crappy cell phone pics! Much love COOP!

I first learned this technique in this thread by Peter Johnsson with some needed correction in the two classes I have taken with Peter.

This was the sword I forged out at our hammer in last Nov, I got it roughed out for my class in AZ and finished it in time for the Arkansas knife show where it won an award forthe "best historically inspired". Normally I don't put to much stock in awards they are nice but often don't mean mucl. In this case however I find it means much more to me, as these awards are determined by the votes of table holders and only that. It means a lot more when it comes from your peers. Oh and the Damascus on this is the last of the billet I passed my performance test for mastersmith with.. coop pics to follow

Well I still need to figure that out a bit .. came up with something for the damascus one that was not to bulky but it is a lot thinner that the mono steel one at the tip.

Got my demo sword all finished up put it on a bit of a diet, got it down to 2lb 11oz before polishing and handle wrapping

Six very tired students a happy teacher And our hosts Jason and Rodger labrash at the end of a very successful falchion class.

Looks like Josh beat me to posting today but here you go. The student go a lot done today and tomorrow will see some awesome swords finished! The leather is 2oz sheep skin vegetable tan. Goat works better and calf skin takes tooling better, but sheap is easily available and works very well other than being a little bit of a pain to skive. MP

day four student got he guards forged and fit as well as several managing to get handle cores finished and pommels started! And we still have two more days!!!!! These guys are KILLING IT!

Today we finished the machine polish on the blades to 400 grit along with some straightening of a small amount if warping that could not be corrected in the final grind. We spent some time with the most excellent book "the sword forum and thought" and explored the use of whole number ratio in our designs. Designs in hand we finished the day by finalizing the tangs making tang shaped drift and beginning forging out the hilts. Tomorrow we will work on finalizing guards forging pommels and making the handle cores. MP

They just don't get northerners! BIG CIRCLE! Simple ratio is a powerful tool.