Manaka Kisuke

“I want to change the way Japanese knives are made; I will always be perfecting the craft.”

Shunsuke Manaka is a young blacksmith at his 40’s from Kasukabe city close to Tokyo. He started making knives 10 years ago and is considered one of the most upcoming young blacksmiths right now. Despite the fact that he is self tought, he reached an amazing level of skill and he managed to perfect his craft. Despite many others that use ready-made cladded pieces of steel, he is forging and welding the steel himself using the Warikomi method.This method is a very old, traditional and difficult thus it results in stronger, tougher, sharper and more durable knives.

We met Shunsuke-San during our visit in Japan and we were amazed to see him at work with just basic tools in his small workshop. He was extremely polite and dedicated a lot of time to explain us his way of work and let us video record the process.  Manaka for sure is one of our favorites!!