McKinley/Marchand Collaboration

Rick Marchand

Rick Marchand

Donkey on the Edge
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Jan 6, 2005
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Hello All,
I don't get the opportunity to take part in many collaborations and when I do, it takes a looooong time to get around to it(as some can attest to.). This one has a cool story, so I'll get that out of the way, first...

I had received a call from my friend and fellow maker, Pete McKinley. He told me a gentleman stopped by his shop in Cape Breton and was continuing on a tour of Nova Scotia. Peter, mentioned that I was down in Lunenburg and he said he might drop in if he gets around my area. That was my "heads up" from Pete. I kinda forgot about it after that... we both did, I think. Fast forward a month or so...

Peter, managed to get a bit of time to himself and I was delighted when he took the long drive to visit with me for a couple days. I can't remember if it was day one or day two but as we sat in the shop, a car pulled up the drive. I was half expecting a customer of mine to drop some blades by for sharpening and figured it was him.

Me: "Yes Sir, welcome to the forge, how can I help you?"
Him: (while pointing over my shoulder)"THAT MAN, sent me here to see you!"

It was the gentleman who dropped by Peter's shop those many weeks ago. We all got a kick out of that... too cool. Anyway, in light of this rather fortunate coincidence, we struck up a deal to do a collaboration piece for him. This was a long time coming plan for Pete and I. Opportunity siezed!

He took a shine to a little Puukko blade I had pounded out months prior. Peter, would work his magic on the handle and I would try to tie it all together with a sheath.

Here are the results...

Acadian Voyageur Knife
Blade - 52100(NJSB), approx 1/8" thick, 4.5"blade, 9" overall length
Handle - Friggin beautiful stacked birch bark, that I'll let Peter chime in on, further down.
Sheath - 9oz veg tan leather, hand dyed tooled and sewn. Copper rivet, firesteel loop and red fibre liners to reflect the handle.

(Note: Peter's handle really set the standard for this collaboration. I wanted to keep the sheath simple and raw while avoiding throwing a pair "cut-off jean shorts" on a refined, Man of Adventure.)











Thanks for looking!
 
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Rick, you do what you do very well.
And that's a great story. (I have a few of my own similar to that, but it should be expected from time to time.)
Beautiful knife, and the birch bark tops it off nicely.
Nuthin' like team work. :thumbup:
 
Good story and project. I like the red liners in the sheath. Great collab.
 
Beautiful knife all the way around, l like the red liners in the sheath.
 
That is an outstanding looking knife! The blade looks very useful, the handle is spectacular and big enough for a large hand, excellent work all around. John
 
Thank you all for the compliments.

Rick, you put together a hell of a fine sheath there, and then took some very nice photos of the whole package. It was wonderful working with you on this project.

The client asked for a handle constructed of material from the Acadian forest, and copper(but, not polished), and stacked bark, in a voyageur-esque style, with peened tang, .... using Rick's scandi blade. So, I had and day's fun with pencil and paper trying to get it right.:D These weren't even close:
DSC_2473_2.jpg

But, I finally arrived at a design I was happy with.

The handle is constructed with:
-Birch bark from the Frenchvale hills of central Cape Breton.
-Moose antler from the Cape Breton Highlands.
-Yellow Birch from Pictou County, N.S.
-Copper reclaimed from the demolished Sydney Boat Works junk pile. The guard and pommel were hammer-textured then heat-colored.
-Red fiber spacer from Rick.

I'm very happy with the way the entire package turned out, and I enjoyed this epic colab-adventure immensely.

-Peter
 
very sweet work, two heads are better'n one eh!
 
Everything about this project is incredibly well done! More collaborations are now required!
 
Very cool when two makers with so much talent get to work on a project like this. Beautifully done, gentlemen!
 
that rocks. I love the forged puukko blade, and the copper on the handle was a great addition. The whole shape of the handle is original and cool. It looks traditional without being a copy.
 
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