Blade 2008 show review

I flew in on Thursday, it took me 16 hours from door to door and almost totally missed the CKCA dinner Thursday night.
Although just like STeven I don't have pics I would like to share my impressions of the show with you'll. My first day was mainly spend on the ABS section...for me by far the best section of the show. A few makers that stood out for me, besides the obvious ones, were John White, Shawn McIntyre, Kevin and Heather Harvey, Ray Rybar and Wade Colter. At the end of that day I had the good fortune to be invited to the ABS dinner. A very classy event with a well deserved price (B.R. Hughes award) for Shawn McIntyre.
A small sidebar.....I had first dibs on his MS dagger, actually it was mine but I let it go a few weeks before the show because of my problems with Dutch Customs, not knowing how more beautiful it was in person then on the pics Shawn had shown me. Peter, I hope you're happy with this one;):D

The second day I spend most of my time on the other side of the room with makers like Paul Jarvis, Arpad Bojtos, John Lewis Jensen, Zaza Reveshvili and the likes. Talked with Arpad about my commission for next year. Went to dinner with a couple of very nice knifeguys like Daniel O'Malley, Wade Colter and Gary House among others at a Brazilian steakhouse.

The final day I spend talking for quite a while with Ray Rybar about how he makes his steel, walked the floor, bought a nice piece of jewelry for Yvonne from Zaza.

My overall impression of the show is that it is large, has a large contingent of very talented makers attending but because I'm only into custom fixed blades a rather large portion of the show (foldermakers and production knives) isn't that much of interest to me.
Would I go again...most definately:thumbup::cool:

After the show on Monday while waiting on my ride to the airport I ran in to Joel Davis by accident. Had a very informative hour on how to make intricate damascus patterns so Monday wasnt wasted either.

Marcel
 
Every time I come up for air from editing, I refresh STeven's first post to see what's next. It's always a real page burner.... :thumbup:

Our highlight of the weekend was a dinner hosted by the STeven. :)

STeven, sorry I missed your visit on Sunday. :grumpy:

Coop
 
I swear, I thought you were kidding when you told me about your puke fest at Alpha Knife Supply.....................

Tanya
 
tntbegg said:
I swear, I thought you were kidding when you told me about your puke fest at Alpha Knife Supply.....................

Tanya
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1. Why would someone joke about vomiting at a trade show?:eek:

2. The thing that sucked was that it was a good friend's booth. I only wish it had been Master Cutlery, right?:D

Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
 
Kohai999 said:
1. Why would someone joke about vomiting at a trade show?:eek:

2. The thing that sucked was that it was a good friend's booth. I only wish it had been Master Cutlery, right?:D

Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
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Were they at the show? If so, perhaps we can arrange a group chunkfest at their booth next year:D
 
Great to meet you too STeven...

and yes I did chain smoke cowboy killer light cigarettes..I do not smoke at home ( Milf hates ciggys ) so I only get to smoke at knife shows...so I chain smoke...My lungs feel like a 20 year veteran of Kentucky Coal Mining..but I digress...

I have to say this man knows his blades..and it was great to hang around him for a while..It really is what blade is all about..meeting friends.. ( and free cigarettes:thumbup:)
 
Ren,
I'd say you win the award for best window decor. Funny stuff!

Steven,
When is this offbeat drama going to continue? You leave the show at the commercial? Give us more! Spare no details, ... this is swine bait!
David
 
Dang, I drive over 3000 miles and miss all the fun!!!!
Did get meet RogerP, though, nice to meet the being behind the screen name!
Next time, I'm going to have to hit the show as my FIRST stop on my trip, NOY try to squezze it in between stops!!!
Thanks for the review, STeven, I get to see more of it than I actually did!
 
More, More!!!!!!! Every thread I read makes me jealous that I shorted myself on time at Blade. I got there Friday morning on a 7:00 AM flight after flying in from Cancun to Tampa late Thursday. Not as bad as last year when I flew out to Cancun on Saturday. I was so beat Friday that I had dinner at Sonnys......blech........and passed out in my room. As I hope to either have a table or a half-table for the JS test next year, I will drive up Thursday morning and leave Monday. Blade is the one show that I have been to where, even as a spectator, you really need the entire three days plus Thursday evening (and lots of sleep ahead of time and afterwords) to see everything and try to meet as many of the knife knuts as possible.
 
STeven,

Another great review - you're right again, we shoulda gone! Got your message, we were up in Canuckland; wanted to read your Blade Show review before calling tho' - will call later today or this weekend, maybe even get the pt.II skinny first that way... :D

Shel

p.s. You custom knife guys are killllin' me here... ;)
 
Nice review, STeven and you survived meeting Ren, Gigster and Bastid......You must be one resilient sob. :D
 
Went back and visited with Jason Knight http://www.jasonknightknives.com for a bit, his son Tristan had some really cool wooden knives that he made, Jason helped him treat the knives with a chemical that turned them black, and Tristan sold most of them, they were very economical, he sold one to Cold Steel's Lynn Thompson, just wait for the Chinese made copy! Jason's knives were superb, but MUST admit, constant upkeep required of carbon steel blades(am now using Brownell's VCI paper, and Tuff Cloth Marine) has me pretty much only interested in damascus, and what Jason had in damascus was hunting knives...and the knives were all virtually flawless. Burt Foster http://www.burtfoster.com was right next to Jason, his knives had little tags explaining what the knife was, and cost, so I amused myself by rearranging the tags and sheaths so nothing would match up.....Burt needed something to keep the boredom of selling all his knives quickly at bay, lol.

Shane Taylor http://www.taylorknives.com gave me a pendant carved from a piece of fossil ivory. It looks like a stylized flame combined with a Maori fishhook, and is really cool, I will wear and cherish it for the rest of my days...after taking leave of Shane, Wally Hayes http://www.hayesknives.com and I got to chat about swords and swordmaking, which was excellent....I picked up a laminated tanto, cord and same' wrapped, from Wally about a year ago, and he does wonderful work. About this time, Peter showed up, and got the damascus crowbar from Gary House, which he seemed delighted with. We went down to the bar for a beer and a shot, and could seriously tell that I was feeling better. Met a photgrapher down in the bar who's name I can't recall, but he does the covers for Tactical Knives magazine, the images he had on his i-touch were superb http://www.tactical-life.com

We went back to the showroom and hung out with Matt Diskin for a while, and Peter found some titanium chopsticks he liked from knife maker Alan Folts
http://www.edcknives.com/vcom/product_info.php?cPath=10_31&products_id=1963We just aimlessly milled about, actually enjoying a slower pace for a change. Went up to the Busse http://www.bussecombat.com/ table to see if I could get some face time with Mr. Jerry, who just happened to have a space in front of him at the 40 FOOT Busse Combat booth, and he a) recognized my name(we have spoken on the phone a few times), OR b) he greets all his customers and potential customers in a familiar manner. Nice guy, regardless, but I don't GET the hog feeding frenzy. Jerry said this year was every bit as strong, if not stronger than previous years.

Microtech http://www.microtechknives.com/home had a nice small booth, Tony Jr. was in attendance and I met his younger brother Shawn(the fella with the Wolverine haircut). I'll tell you, there was a fine specimen of cougar, yumm, working that booth, and her cub as well....the fruit does not fall far from the tree, friends!
I found SAR knives booth http://www.sarcustomknives.com Spencer picked me out a really nice Psyclops neck knife, with a spear point blade, I think these are excellent, nice price, unique and useful...went back to Microtech's booth, and the show closed down for the day.

Met Roger P. in the lobby, and we waited for Matt Roberts, and his wife to show up for dinner(they never did, weenies crashed out in their room(right, wink wink) and didn't wake up until 8:00 pm)...Roger called Coop and asked him if he and his wife wanted to join us for dinner, which they did. My oldest friend, Chris,(we have been buds since 1982) lives in Atlanta, and came to dinner as well.

A word about Kevin Rathbun Steak http://www.kevinrathbunsteak.com I found this restaurant in an Esquire magazine, last November while washing my clothes at a laundromat at 11:00 pm in Kyoto, Japan. It was highly rated as a new restaurant, and obviously, located in Atlanta, and seemed like a good choice. The food was excellent(I requested no seasoning on many of the steaks, otherwise, it is very salty) and the staff was competent...prices are moderately high. The black bottom creme brulee was top notch.

Coop gave me a ride back to the Waverly, for some quality pit time. Roger went back to the Sheraton(friggin' weenie) and Coop and Susan went back for some nap time as well. Time at this point was about 11:00 pm.Hooked up with Thomas and Jeff again, wrestled around some with Tim Galyean again, listened to some fairly very ok live music some guys affiliated with Emerson Knives(so I was told) played, met some guys from the Forums who actually read the crap I write(stand up and identify, fellas), and staggared back to the Sheraton about 1:00 am...and got tormented by Peter viciously throwing me crap for an hour..dude can be such a fukkker.

Sunday....yup you guessed it...up at 7:30 am to catch up with my fellow CKCA http://www.customknifecollectorsassociation.com mates so we can prep for the 10:00 am seminar that Kevin hosted...and made badges up until it was showtime. I thought Kevin did a very thorough and informative seminar, and there were more people in attendance than I expected. After the seminar, I walked the show floor for a while, catching up with some people and scoring a nice piece of desert ironwood from Texas Knifemaker's Supply http://www.texasknife.com At 12:00pm, more of us from the CKCA went back into the seminar room(which was pretty frikkin tiny) and made badges until almost 2:00 pm.

Kevin had to split, back to work on Monday, so we said goodbye, and hung out with Matt Diskin a little bit more, and Peter decided to go gift shopping, so I tagged along. The nature of shows and knife collecting is very circular, so I don't make a big deal out of hellos and goodbyes, because it is about "until next time" rather than "farewell, forever" or so we hope, but the older you get, the more that changes....and then the show was over. Peter and I went back to the Sheraton, got him packed up, had a drink, and got him on the shuttle to the airport, I went back to the showroom, and helped Matt load his stuff onto the Bybee's truck, and we went out to dinner at Maggianos Little Italy http://www.maggianos.com with Mike Vagnino http://www.mvknives.com and is wife, Bill Burke and his wife, Henry Torres http://www.htknives.com and his wife, Tom Ferry http://www.tferryknives.com and Dave Lisch. Matt and I split the baked ziti and sausage, which was the smart move, really tasty. This place is like Bucca de Beppo, which I hate, but with REAL good italian food. Would totally go back.

We all split up, but Matt and I went back to the pit, some good MMA on big screen in the side bar, and just enough people to keep it interesting, INCLUDING someone I personally admire a great deal, Dick Marcinko, http://www.dickmarcinko.com , the original Rogue Warrior. I met Chief "Patches" Watson at the OKCA in Eugene a few years ago, and he signed a book for me, so am hoping can get Dick Marcinko to do the same. Wendy was still shooting me stinkeye, but she fortunately went up to her room early, so I could still have fun, lol Matt and I BS's for a while, and I had to get going, the plane left at 9:00 am on Monday.

Thanks for reading all of this, if you liked my story, consider going to Blade next year yourself, and having your OWN adventure, it was really nice to have met so many new people!


Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
 
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LOL......Actually the cheering mob at the Busse booth looked like they were piled up 7 deep this year as opposed to the meager 5 in '07. Those cats are a biz school case study in fanatical brand loyalty:eek: I have no personal knowlege as to the quality/mystique of the Busse line, but at least Mr. Busse and Company make a product that looks like a proper field knife and not a prop from from some sci fi flick.
 
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Awesome report, as usual, STeven. Had to take a few breaks to rest. Were you slammin' some energy drinks between alcohol? ;)

Seemed to be a great show from all accounts to date. Really enjoying yours.

- Joe
 
I don't know how you do it. Remembering each moment and hour. I AM impressed. :thumbup:

Like my images, the told story is sometimes even more captivating....! <BIG wink>

Thank you.

Coop
 
Bailey Bradshaw said:
Steven,

WTF......How is the katana??

Anxious to hear how it cuts....
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Katana is fine, I will amend review, sorry...you try this without notes!

James Williams and I were on the same flight, and both worried about our swords, mostly, lol.

Steven
 
Great review Steven,It was nice to meet you,but too brief.If I am fortunate enough to make it again,I'd like to talk more.You have great taste in knives :thumbup:.
-Vince
 
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