I think it depends on what you’re using it for. A thinly ground grail knife will not baton well, a giant chopper will not be a great tool for some tasks, a slipjoint isn’t going to be good for self defense, and an automatic isn’t going to be great for someone who works in an extremely dirty environment. A fisherman won’t want 1095 in the ocean, a doctor won’t want to do surgery with a karambit and a chef would not like to cut an onion with a kukuri.
Depending on what you’re doing, or what kind of life you live, your definition of grail is going to vary. Because of that, the standard of what makes a good knife a good knife is going to vary from person to person. I think a well made knife, will fit into any category of person, everyone would probably want to carry something well made/designed.
I also don’t think many people outside of the knife community really think of knives in terms of a grail to purchase later on. I know my friend just uses a no-name swiss army style knife to open boxes at work. For most people, that’s what a knife is.
For knife nuts, I think our grails will vary with time.
Grails used to be a knife you saw on display at a physical store. The best ones with a fancy display box. With a price tag that you had to pay up front, full retail. You could handle the knife, understand it physically, and make an educated decision. Maybe even after a couple visits.
Nowadays, grails sit on a webite. The display box is an advertisement, or a YouTube video, or an Instagram post, an email, or a Reddit thread.
You can’t handle the knife. You can split the payment up into bite sized steps, through multiple different eager companies willing to lend you the cash. You can save the website page with the grail and refresh it daily until you see the moment, it’s in stock! The rush of buying the knife, if you don’t get it know, you’ll pay more later. The FOMO in full force takes over your more rational decision making. The purchase is done but until it arrives physically, it’s still simply a promise of what the knife should be from what you’ve seen.
Then it arrives, is it a lemon? In physical stores, you could have figured that out. Online, it’s going to be a gamble. Maybe the wood grain, the stag bone, or the carbon fiber is a bad pattern? Who knows. The grail is yours, perhaps it is smaller than you would’ve liked. Or too big. The dimensions on a screen feel different to ones in the hand.
Ultimately, I think if you have a true desire for a knife. It’s always a good thing to have goals, so it’s not a bad thing. However grail culture has gotten out of hand. The only grail you should have in life is for the betterment of yourself and those around you, trying to find perfection in an object will only highlight the flaws of it. If you love a knife, for whatever reason, that in itself is the grail. It’s not the knife that is the grail, but the grail is your love, appreciation, and history with it. A grail can be a cheap knock off swiss army knife that you use to open boxes at work with, and anyone trying to tell you different is trying to sell you the idea of perfection in an imperfect world.
