Q & A with Matt

Have a question about the William Henry multiverse? Email community@williamhenry.com and Matt will choose a couple to answer in this monthly forum... Question:  Do you use any ivory material? Nope.  OK, a little more info.  We’ve never used new ivory in any form – I NEVER wanted to be part of an industry that has such awful stories connected to...

Have a question about the William Henry multiverse? Email community@williamhenry.com and Matt will choose a couple to answer in this monthly forum... Question:  Where do you make your products? We design and build virtually every WH piece, across all categories, in our studio in Oregon.  We have three separate shops – one for knives and money clips, one for pens...

Have a question about the William Henry multiverse? Email community@williamhenry.com and Matt will choose a couple to answer in this monthly forum... Question:  Where do you get your amazing materials? Everywhere.  Literally.  I’ve been at this for 30 years now, and WH has been around for 22 and counting.  During all that time, I and the staff at WH have searched out rare and storied materials and where to find them.  We’ve built relationships with some of the best metal forgers, engravers, silver smiths, gold smiths and other artisans in the world. We’ve found the individuals who find fossil materials, the finest shells, the best premium natural woods, and the most exotic state of the art alloys and polymers.  It’s a global supply chain of mostly very small shops and businesses that we’ve cultivated to be able to make the coolest stuff we can imagine, one piece at a time, one day at a time. Wooly Mammoth, just one of the unique material we use to create our one-of-a-kind products Question:  Are your blades engraved? Never.  After all these years, some people still look at our forged damascus steel blades and think the patterns are ‘engraved’ on the blades.  Continue reading →

Have a question about the William Henry multiverse? Email community@williamhenry.com and Matt will choose a couple to answer in this monthly forum... Question:  What is Koftgari? Koftgari is an ancient Persian technique for inlaying precious metal into steel.  I have an old knife that I found in a bazaar in Pakistan that features sterling silver inlaid into the forged steel...

Have a question about the William Henry multiverse? Email community@williamhenry.com and Matt will choose a couple to answer in this monthly forum... Question:  How long does it take to make a WH knife? I’ve always answered this question “Until it’s done”. Maybe a little trite, but it’s the truth. It’s also true that we orchestrate a global dance on many of our knives, working with master artisans wherever they may be to bring the best to each aspect of the design. As a result, an average knife takes about a year to complete. Yep, a year. Involves anywhere from 6 to 11 different shops in as many as four countries. We source amazing materials, work with a number of shops and artisans to prep those materials and turn them into precision parts to our specifications, and then go thru 500-800 separate steps in our Oregon studio to craft each knife from those custom parts. Not easy to do, near impossible to copy, and a daily miracle that we pull it off. Continue reading →