About the Artist

[Dept of PMM Hall of Steel]

The Bladesmith

This is what you will see if I am at a sca event or renaissance fair except that my hair is a lot shorter now.

My mission in life is to take over the world through the use of superior cutlery, however I lack the drive, the patience and I'm just to damn lazy too do so. In lieu of taking over the world I will just have to settle for providing superior cutlery to people that do have the drive, the focus, and aren't too damn lazy (no offense to the lazy resistance fighters who are holding down couches every where and there-by halting the ottoman advance. viva la resistance)

And this is a little story about how i got started I'll add more about me later on. 
Hello my name is Brandon Sawisch and I have been making knives under the Dragon Cutlery name since 1999. And this is my web site. Now to my short story. I've always, as long as I can remember, owned at least one knife. I can remember buying my first real knife at ten years of age (my dad tells people I was older so they don't think he was crazy). Later on I started making handles for my knives after my dog decided that my new case knife was a delicious chew toy. (Still have the dog don't know where the knife is though) After that I made a handle or two for some friends. Then I started to buy knives without handles or easily removed handles with blades that I liked. Then one day I hit the bargain bin at the local Meijer store and I saw it, the book (I still have this book but its under lock and key so you can't have it, it's mine all mine). I didn't know what I had at that point, but it was gold. It was a book full of knives and always having had an interest in them I bought it. Only later did I realize that this wasn't the new year models from the factory, I realized at that moment (or a moment damn close to that one) that real people in their own homes and shops could make knives (really really big knives... ok ok I was young but I still drool when the new one comes out and I always will so there). That and some old fox fire books my dad got at a garage sale got me started making my own blades from scratch. And later a copy of step-by-step knifemaking you can do it! by david boye. I built a forge and grabbed the old vise for a striking surface a claw hammer and quickly learned why you don't make the top of the forge out of aluminum. Eventually i got the proper tools (but it wasn't easy, never go to the local grocery store to buy one Wile E. Coyote style acme anvil it doesn't work so don't try it) and started making knives and that as they say is most of the story (more to come after I get a few more offers for the movie rights). I'll probably add more after the amnesia wears off from the first test of the anvil and catapult but that pretty much covers it for now. hope you had as much fun reading it as I had living it !! 

 

http://dragoncutlery.com/bladesmith.html