Seki City in Gifu Prefectures is one of the four corner stones of Japanese knife making. With the purity of water and pine charcoal it is a favoured place of many of Japan’s finest knife makers.

One such knife maker, Kenji Matsumoto, has a small workshop with around 20 blacksmiths that produce a very wide range of kitchen knives and accessories that are supreme examples of hand made knives. They are not only amongst the sharpest and well-balanced blades but also visually beautiful.

The Suradai (meaning breathtaking sharpness) Collection is made from 63 Layers of steel. A hard super steel (VG10 - 1.1% to 1.3% High Carbon toughened with Cobalt) layer is sandwiched by 31 layers of alternating soft steels on either side.

The thin hard steel layer (60:62 HRC) makes the blade capable of being sharpened to extreme levels whilst the hand beating of the blade with a hydraulic hammer compacts the steel crystals more than rolling or drop forging, resulting in a knife with outstanding endurance. The soft outer layers make the knife easy to sharpen even after several years.

Twisting the outer layers when making the original layered sheet of steel from which the knife blank is cut creates the ‘Damascus’ pattern. Whilst the pattern itself is only for aesthetic reasons, the number of layers provides more strength and the more layers there are the thinner the blade can be made. This makes it possible to make the blade sharper and stronger.

The Suradai Collection is very well finished with a beautiful Pakka wood (a laminated hard wood with silicon injection) handle that feels extremely smooth and comfortable with fully forged tang and three rivets it has the classic looks of a kitchen knife.

The collection comprises of a 90mm Paring knife, 120mm Petty knife, 150mm Utility / fish / game knife, 170mm Santoku Chefs knife, 210mm Gyuto Chefs knife, 240mm Gyuto Chefs knife and a 270mm slicing /carving and filleting knife.