Mareko Maumasi At Vivront, July 2025
Meet the maker series.
Transcript created via audio file. Um’s removed and content edited for clarity and intent.
TL;DR
Context
Vivront: Kitchen knife shop in Edina, MN — sharpening, classes, serving restaurants and home cooks. Event connected to Craft Made Aprons and their charitable foundation Help the House. Mareko designed a Kevlar apron for makers that blends workshop utility with chef/kitchen functionality.
Mareko Maumasi is a world‑class bladesmith and Damascus steel artist, creating heirloom kitchen knives that blend history, precision, and stunning design. From ancient pattern recreations to bold new mosaics, his work is as functional as it is unforgettable.
Mareko’s Craft
Values precision and proportion despite working by hand. Believes a great knife can transform cooking from drudgery to joy. Aiming for heirloom quality. Renowned for complex damascus patterns. Yet, holds to performance over aesthetics.
Industry Views
Believes education is essential for makers. Desires higher standards among makers. Believes marketing and education are essential for makers.
Process
Learning is essential and Markeo learns most from mistakes. Inspired by patterns all around, nature and everyday life. Share openly so as to also learn openly.
Transcript
[00:00:00]
Joseph: Welcome to Vivront.
We're a kitchen knife shop. As you know, we have knives from around the world. It started as sharpening and we teach classes down the middle of the store and we have an opportunity to service the restaurant industry in town and more.
And, there's a group called Craft Made Aprons. You guys know those guys? They run a foundation called Help the House.
Kate was telling me about somebody who's got a brain tumor. The foundation is involved in helping them. It's that kind of a foundation. And they brought Mareko in… did you bring your apron?
Mareko: Oh,
Joseph: …because he has a kevlar apron that was made by the Craftmade team.
Mareko: I [00:01:00] designed the apron for Makers, but also in a way that it could still be used in a restaurant or home setting.
It's got a, the way, it's got a front panel that holds all these different tools and stuff like that for us who are constantly measuring, cutting, drawing or marking things. It looks kind of like a superhero. It's so good. It's pretty good. But, so I designed it and then Kate made it and it turned out great.
Yeah.
Joseph: So that kicked up a friendship and you've been back to Minnesota a number of times for either a hammer in to help with, education on all kinds of things, raising money for the foundation or knife making education. So we have a couple knife makers, the best ones in this state, in my view, in the room today as well.
So that's what brings us all together.
I'll just ask questions. And you chat. How's that… fire away?
Mareko: Yeah, let's do it.
Joseph: So you have a [00:02:00] shop. It's out in Washington
Mareko: Olympia. Washington
Joseph: Olympia, which is southwest of Seattle. Yeah. You've been making out there for?
Mareko: I think cumulative of 15 years, I've been making knives full time.
Joseph: It's fantastic.
So you, the shop has gone through multiple iterations. Yeah, It has had different lives.
Mareko: Yeah. I got my start working for a knife maker.
Joseph: Yeah. But we'll hold onto that.
Mareko: Yeah.
Joseph: In your shop, do you have an object that would be like a Tailsman, like a good luck charm that if it was gone only you would notice?
You'd be like, ah.
Mareko: Hmm. I probably either have a little ruler, a metal ruler that's only about six inches long or half inch wide that I use all the time, or my calipers or, oh, what was the other thing? I can't remember what the other one was, but those are like the two things that I, or a center punch, like I use it so often to hit and it's so important.[00:03:00]
And when I lose track of it, I'm just like, I tear up the whole shop looking for it.
Joseph: And why are those tools so important?
Mareko: It's for accuracy.
Yeah. I guess as precision as handmade can be, yeah. It's important to me. 'cause even though it is handmade, I do as much as possible, and by hand to be accurate.
Every once in a while you need those numbers and that data to be able to keep everything nice and centered and even, and I dunno, it's a very artistic approach, but I also, I'm like, proportions are really important to me and evenness. So I try to do that as best as I possibly can or present that in my work.
Joseph: It's great. Like the little tools. I wouldn't have thought it was gonna be a little ruler.
Mareko: That's pretty much the work at hand. I use it a lot.
Joseph: So, when you're getting your start, at one point you traded salsa shoes for a workshop broom. Take us through that.
Mareko: So I, [00:04:00] I met a maker, he gave me a chance to work at his shop. At the time I was working at a restaurant, prepping and cooking and washing dishes, occasionally busing. And I was also moonlighting as a salsa dancing instructor, with a friend who, and originally I started, dancing with by taking classes at the community college.
She was the instructor of the class. It was just a PE credit and I was pretty good at it, and it was super fun. And so she asked me to become her dance partner. And we started doing just small community performances, and instruction both private and public. And then, at a certain point in my life, I was just like, I don't know what I'm doing with my life, actually.
And so she's tried to set, or she did set, me up with her new boss. She just started doing the administrative end of his business. And, he had been, he is a professional knife maker, but he had worked in restaurants as well. He had been a professional clown for Ringling, Barham and [00:05:00] Bailey. He had also, I had come to learn later, owned an import store and the sharpening business and knife business, very similar to this, a knife retailer.
And yeah, so she introduced me to him. We ended up getting along really well and he offered me a chance to work in the shop. I'd never really done any metal work up to that point in my life. I'd done all kinds of creative work, especially around woodworking or drawing and making things, but never really metal.
And it turns out I'm pretty good at it.
Joseph: Fantastic. Yeah.
I wasn't a metal worker either until I started this. Sure. Like, wait, I'm a sculptor now? Okay.
What are the variables in making that you think you lean on most frequently?
Mareko: I don't know. And I never knew that metal would be my thing, and that this work would be my thing.
But I think what really helps to inform the knives that I make is my background in working in the culinary arts, in the culinary industry [00:06:00] for several years, as well as cooking at home since I was 15, because my mom decided she was done cooking. She listened to me complaining about what's for dinner. And so she's like, guess what? You're making dinner tonight?
And all I could say is I don't know, I don't know how to cook. And she's like, don't worry, I'll walk you through it. And so she walked me through it and it was a great experience because it was one of the many things up to that point in my life that I've, I've done, especially in regards to creating and making things.
It's just like another one of those variations. And so, then I started cooking and food became a thing for me. And it was just like another kind of feather in my hat in regards to making things that I really loved. In the song. I actually joke about salsa dancing, but I actually credit my mom and my love for cooking to my mom and that informs my knife making.
In regards to metalworking, it's just, it's been an interesting medium to [00:07:00] work with, because in a cold state is a very durable material to say the least. But once you heat it up, it becomes almost like a clay-like material, takes on, it goes into a plastic state of source where you can form it and mush it around really, and transform it into, from a block of metal into a rough forged blade that then becomes a tool eventually.
And you can do that with all kinds of different cutting tools and other tools in general, like hammers, pry bars and whatever. And it's, it's really interesting to play with it. And I don't know. I think I've always had a thing for fire.
Oh, I'm a Leo, so I'm allowed to love fire. Right?
Joseph: What is it about us as humans huddling around fire pretty regularly? And working with the blade for thousands of years? When I go over to my friend's house, I just hang out in the kitchen. Because that's where the fire is. But then there's all these [00:08:00] blades around.
What do you think? Why is the blade always part of this process?
Mareko: I mean, to me, what I've come to over time, in making, you know, well in, in cooking and working in the industry as well as making knives, I couldn't realize as well, I guess, I dunno reading a lot. Like I read a lot of stories about history or articles about history and books and stuff.
And if you think about, ancient man, like we could hammer things with our fists or feet or we could do a lot of things. We could mold things and build things. But one of the things we really lacked as a predator were claws. And so a cutting tool of some sort has always been really necessary for us in regards to processing food, whether it be vegetables or protein or whatever it is.
And so early on people were trying to figure that out, and I think that has always been a part of, I, I don't know if it's in our DNA, but it's really important in regards to, the work that we do and to make food for ourselves to nourish ourselves, the ones we [00:09:00] care about, friends and family.
And I think fire is obviously a big part of that, especially when you go back again to talking about ancient man or humans. It was a place of safety. It was a place of community. We come together to share meals, or what we've gathered and forge, to share stories, to learn from each other.
It's really important. I think the kitchen is kind of the new fire, obviously, like people have fireplaces, but most people spend their time hanging out in the kitchen. And food is such an important part of, I mean, we need food to survive, right? And there's, I think it's hard to say that there are more important things that we can do for ourselves and for the ones we care about. And people are a community to provide nourishing meals to each other and for each other. And I think that is the, it's a, it really is a very loving act. And I think it has, I mean, for me at least, has a lot of value and it really means a lot to me. To be able to [00:10:00] go to some of these places and, and share those experiences with them.
And the knives that I make, the goal is to try to help to elevate that experience. 'cause often cutting and preparing food can be kind of a drag and not very fun. But if it's with a tool that is very sharp and it holds the edge well and it can fall through the food very easily, then you're getting that work done in a much more enjoyable way.
It helps to elevate, like I said, that experience and transform it from drudgery to possibly one of the more enjoyable aspects of the cooking experience. And then also trying to make tools that have kind of like have an heirloom quality to them that if properly cared for, like the tools that are being handmade that you see on these shelves here, they really could last for a hundred years, which sounds crazy in a world where so many of the things that we own are, have an aspect of engineered obsolescence to them where they.
Just aren't useful anymore, but they are still pulling [00:11:00] swords and knives and stuff out of the ground that have been in the earth for thousands of years and they could still, if they were sharp and do the work of whatever it was they're supposed to be doing. And so I have a similar kind of approach.
Ideologically speaking, I’m trying to create a tool that, while it is pretty, is ultimately a tool first and built with integrity and, longevity in mind rather than it's gonna get dull and then you don't wanna use it, but it was cheap enough so you just throw it away or donate it to the goodwill and you go get another site.
I want to create tools that you carry along with you through your lifetime. You pass them down to your families. They have all these shared experiences using these things and they continue on for as long as possible. Really.
Joseph: We had a period of time, pre twenties, when the industrial revolution came and factories started making things [00:12:00] where the bladesmith was seven doors down. And they made everything. They were bladesmiths. They were blacksmiths.
Mareko: Yeah. Every village, town, city, they had their blacksmiths who dealt with fabricating and building and fixing all kinds of things from, especially on the farms and stuff like that. Fixing those tools that are really important.
But even making hinges and locks and door handles and stuff like that, around the communities they're a really important part. Super crucial.
Joseph: Have you ever made anything that you felt like it came through you versus like you made it?
Mareko: Mm. I feel that way often about a lot of, especially the patterns that I make. I'm very well known for my Damascus patterns. They're extremely ornate. And, but a lot of them start as kind of like a vision in my mind's eye. And if I have to like to draw it out [00:13:00] on a, I actually have in my wallet a little tiny notebook and, and I have a pen in my wallet as well.
So I can draw these things out because what I do, what I see is the finished design and I draw that out. And then my job at that point is to figure out how to reverse engineer, identify different nuances about that particular pattern, how it can be broken down and created through the forge welding and forge forging process.
And sometimes it's something very simple, three or four steps, and sometimes something a lot more complicated that requires 40 or 50 steps and several days, if not weeks of work. Why can I do that? I don't really understand. And that's why I feel like when you say that, I was like, I don't know how I know how to do this.
I do think some of it comes from making a lot of mistakes. And I've learned the most probably from the mistakes that I've made in trying to plan out patterns and thinking everything's going honky doory. And then I get to the final bar and I'm like, that doesn't look like that. How [00:14:00] did that happen?
What?
And so it's just, trying to transform mistakes into meaningful lessons that teach me more about the process and the craft then I would've learned otherwise. With everything going perfectly successfully. I've actually learned a lot more from my mistakes for sure than success.
Joseph: Like you accelerate into 'em?
Mareko: I dunno if I accelerate into them. I'm very frustrated with them for sure. But, I do try to take the time to understand what happened because I have been doing this for a long time in regards to Damascus making. I've been making Damascus patterns and patterned welded steel for 13 years, going on 14 years.
And so when I make a mistake or something happens that I don't expect, then I'm trying to figure out what that is. Or if I see something out there in the world that somebody else has done, I'm like, whoa, that's interesting what happened there. And I'm trying to reverse engineer their stuff and [00:15:00] thankfully I have that ability.
There, there aren't very many patterns that I've looked at that I haven't been able to reverse engineer. I'm actually, I've reverse engineered even patterns that were being made in ancient Rome that were unearthed, sorry, I have to try to recall this.
They were unearthed in the 1850s in Denmark. And then because of war and stuff that was happening over there in the late 18 hundreds, archeological work had been put on pause. And it wasn't until the seventies or eighties again that they opened it back up and they started pulling these artifacts, these ancient swords out of the ground and started documenting them again.
But they were for a couple years able to take some photographs or do some lithographs of some of the patterns, but they were completely unusual compared to everything else that they had seen up to that point. And it turns out that they were using what is typically referred to as mosaic Damascus pattern [00:16:00] welding techniques, as early as 50 AD, which hasn't happened again until the last 15 years.
These patterns, while they present very simply, because of the material that they were using in that time and the temperatures and the heat sources they would've been using as well as the limitations of the tooling they would've been using at that time, trying to understand how all of those factored in to how the material was actually moving to create those lines.
And I've, since they've unearthed them in the 1850s, nobody's been able to reverse engineer those patterns until I did about five years ago. And so now it's a matter of trying to take the time, to make full replicas and then working with scholars or archeologists who are still currently studying those.
To work on some articles that get those out into the world more than anything. Just to deepen the understanding of the work that went into creating these things. I don't know if I answered your [00:17:00] question.
Joseph: Do you wanna show this in terms of high contrast damascus?
Mareko: It's kind of tricky sometimes to see this, but kind of the backstory on this piece is that a friend of mine is a very talented brewer up in Anchorage, Anchorage, Alaska. He owns Anchorage Brewing. His name's Gabe Fletcher, and he has a barley wine that he has won best barley wine in the world with multiple years over.
And it's called a Deal with the Devil because in an early article, the author, the journalist said that he must have made a deal with the devil to be able to make a barley wine this good. And so this, I guess it was a couple years ago, he asked if I couldn't make a damascus pattern that looked like a devil's skull.
And I had actually already had a kind of a conceptual drawing of a skull. So it was just a matter of trying to figure out how to incorporate a horn into that skull. And then also trying to figure out other pattern elements to add to the material to give it kind of like that devilish kind of effect.
And so [00:18:00] along the edge of this blade, there are these pattern elements that look like flames. The skull is actually just half of the skull with the horn coming off one side. And you can see, and the pattern is intrinsic to the material. So a lot of people think it's a surface treatment, but it is actually all the way through the material.
'cause you're physically combining two different types of material together. One that etches black, one that etches silver, to create these events, these patterns and these different elements. And so this is kind of the, as far as I'm aware, I think the first time that anybody's tried to create a, pictographic representation of something like a skull or like a Devil's skull,
that looks like it could be an actual, like drawing or illustration or photography, I guess, or photograph of something. And then the handle material was made from Woodford Reserve, barrel stave that the beer was actually aged in for several months before then being transferred, and bottled.
And, yeah, I think that's it. It's something else. Like, yeah. Tricky is, yeah. [00:19:00] Sorry. No, it's just, it's interesting. A lot of people see all kinds of different stuff. One person said they saw somebody diving into water, but if you hold it vertically, basically what you see is like the eye socket and kind of like the nasal cavity, the top teeth, the top of the skull, and then a horn, and then, but there's no bottom jaw or anything.
Joseph: And If you flip it over and you see the other side in the spine.
So when I saw this this afternoon, it was… yeah. We pickup a lot of knives. They’re a utility. It's fine. It's 50 bucks. It's. $12. It's whatever, right? Sure. But a knife is not a knife.
It's not a knife when you start to lean in the direction of art and craft at the level of execution here. Like, this one, to me, I was just quiet and didn't tell you guys what I was thinking. I was like, “oh my goodness.” Because it's got a sense of presence on its own in ways that others don't.
They're like, whatever, it's a knife. Sure. You know what I mean? [00:20:00]
Mareko: Yeah. I think part of what comes through when people see or hold my work for the first time is that I'm, I feel like I'm really pouring myself into this. I see this as an extension of who I am as a maker, as a person, and just, I want the, my care, my forethought, my planning, my execution, all to be adequately represented in my finished work. To be seen as an heirloom piece that could be passed down through the generations.
A hashtag I used to use, when I would make a post on social media or something like that, it was called a, or was it, it was a Future Antiques of America. So things like that, because, especially the hardness that these knives are at and, and many of them here, they not only take a keen edge, but they'll hold it for quite a long time.
Along with a few things that you can do on your own as a user to help to kind of take care of that knife or that, that fine delicate edge that's actually doing the [00:21:00] work. The longer you can go between sharpening and the less you have to sharpen the knife. The longer it's gonna last. And realistically, like a knife like this, it'll transform, it'll get narrower or become a slicer or a boning knife or filet knife over a couple hundred years, but they really could last for a very long time.
I make these very fancy, polished out knives, but my favorite knives to buy and collect are our old, carbon steel knives that are stained and rusted. Because to me what I'm seeing is the use and the relationship that a person had with that tool as a tool. And I want these, the knives that I built, to reflect that.
So even though they're pretty, they are always tools first, and they're designed and manufactured in a way so that they perform at the highest level possible.
Joseph: What things do cooks and home cooks want in a knife that they don't know how to ask for? [00:22:00]
Mareko: Hmm. I think… I don't know. That's probably a better question for the… unfortunately there's been a lot of marketing around what a knife can do or what it can't do or how to care for it and how, or how, like what to let go.
Not sharpening a knife is not a real thing. Every knife, any cutting tool, whether it's in the wood shop, shearing metal or, or cooking in the kitchen, like everything needs to be sharpened at some point. And, then when it comes to I guess like stain and resistance. You know, there are stainless knives and there are high carbon steel knives.
I almost work exclusively in carbon steel. And one of the big concerns people have for that is that, oh, doesn't it rust really easily? I was like. Sure if you leave it, laying it around with a bunch of water on it. And I talk to people often asking, you know, do you own cast iron? And they're like, yeah, I love my cast iron.
It was like my [00:23:00] cast iron. It was my great grandmother's and a lot of people's cast iron was handed down. It was really important to purchase for them because of the quality of that tool and the way it performs as a cooking tool. And I'm like, well, you have a relationship with that.
You have to have a relationship with this knife too. Too often we're told that you don't have to do anything. It'll keep its edge, it'll never rust. This is a tool that you have to have a relationship with, but as you nurture that relationship, you have this kind of familiarity with it and it becomes kind of part of your family in a way.
It's your go-to, you have to take care of it. And so just like a cast iron pan, you don't just leave it half full of water in the sink, you take care of it, you rinse it out. You scrub it either with however to get the grease off or you deglaze the pan. You oil it, you store it safely and you, and you put it away for the next time around.
And it's the same thing actually with a carbon steel knife. Unless I'm cutting really oily foods or raw foods, if it's just fruits and vegetables, I just rinse it off and dry it, put it away. [00:24:00] I always try to make sure it's dry before I put it away. I don't even actually usually use any kind of special oils or anything.
Because I kind of like the patina that develops on carbon steel blades where oil will help to preserve more of its original appearance. Yeah. I think a big thing is just having that relationship with those tools.
I can't even remember what you said. I just started talking.
Joseph: It's good.
How about ergonomics? Things about the knife that... Not only are you executing at an artistic level, it's a piece intended for utility.
Mareko: Yeah. I mean, a lot of things that are tricky as a custom maker to take into account are the relationship that the user is gonna have with that tool.
And that's gonna be informed by how tall they are, how short they're, or actually I guess more relevantly, like what the relationship with their counter space looks like. And, and that's gonna inform, the angle at which you like, design the edge profile.
And then [00:25:00] anybody over there that wants to take a look at it, please feel free. Just don't drop it please.
The size of the person's hand is gonna inform the size of the knife. I actually have quite large hands for only being five foot eight. My brother-in-law is six foot four, and he and I have the same size hands. And I just try to make the smallest comfortable handle for my hand.
And it often has a tendency to be comfortable for both large hand people and small handed people. The balance of the knife is really important. Often the knives I make are what are called forged integral bolster knives. So the bolster is essentially where the blade terminates and transitions into the handle.
And there's usually a massive amount of material there. And that's some sort of steel, whether it's stainless steel, carbon steel or Damascus steel. And that helps to kind of centralize the weight of that knife, as well as the balance point. And because carbon steel has a higher carbon content, that is freely [00:26:00] available within the chemistry of that material, it can actually get harder than most stainless steel.
Now there are higher performance stainless boutique steels, that match the performance of carbon steels, but most of the generic stuff requires having extra material on the blade to help stabilize the edge that is actually doing the work where you don't need all that extra bulk to be able to still have a stable edge on a carbon steel knife and get a better cutting performance.
Although, that extra weight often is then sold as heavier, stronger, or tougher or heavier, is gonna hold up. What's better over time or it's gonna perform better because it's thicker, it's gonna cut through the food and then the food's gonna fall off. But it also creates a wedging effect, with a lot of, whether it's carrots or onions or apples or, washer or whatever that wedging because of the thickness of that blade.
If you were to cut it down from spine to belly to look at that cross section, it can be almost twice as thick as that knife. The [00:27:00] way that knife is ground is so that it falls through food as easily as possible while still retaining that edge stability that is necessary for it to perform as a quality tool.
And so, because it requires less material. To be able to have that edge stability. Obviously if somebody has a preference for that weight, then a custom maker can take that in consideration in regards to how they grind the knife, but it also reduces the weight of the knife. And for some people, especially, I have customers who have carpal tunnel, that is a very serious consideration for them.
And so that helps to reduce the weight of the knife. Even though we're sold again with the heavier knives, oh, it falls for the food much easier. But the reality is like you also have to lift that weight back up again. You realize that it doesn't just do it on its own. And so with the way that knife is ground, it has what's called a compound grind, which is a hollow grind above a convex grind.
And, it's designed to fall through the food pretty effortlessly and reduce what I often [00:28:00] refer to as cut friction. A lot of people look to food release as a metric by which they're judging or determining what is a quality knife . But really more for me from my experience in my background working in a production environment.
Cut friction is more important, the reduction of cut friction, so that it requires less force. So if you have a lightweight knife that's very easy to pick up, but then also very easily falls through the food because of its actual topographical changes along the surface of that blade. You got a great knife right there, especially with a thin edge.
It's got, it's much thinner at the edge, so it also slides through the food much easier. These are all good things. It doesn't have to be a heavy knife to be a great knife, but again, it's custom made. It's interesting, the room's split between some makers over here and users over on this side.
There are definitely users on this end too, but, but as makers, these are all things that are, I believe, are really important to have knowledge and understanding about, which I actually came and taught a couple years ago at the [00:29:00] knife makers, hammer in, down in Mankato and, around chef's knife design so that they can make a more informed decision about how they're making the knife rather than being like, this looks like a chef's knife.
And there are, unfortunately, there are a lot of makers out there who want to make culinary knives, but are only making knives that look like culinary knives, but don't actually perform with the nuanced qualities that high performance custom handmade culinary knives perform with.
That was a lot of talking.
Joseph: That's good.
What's a belief you have about knives and knife making that you hold strongly and other makers disagree with?
Mareko: I feel like you're leading me… twist up. I can't, I'm not sure what it is right now. My ADD brain is kind of blacking out. I don't know.
You wanna gimme another hint?
Joseph: I don't know what you're gonna say. There's usually controversy, right? And [00:30:00] some of it is under what you were just saying, it looks like a knife.
Mareko: Right.
Joseph: It doesn't act like a knife.
Mareko: Unfortunately, there's just a lot of misunderstanding about what makes a quality culinary knife.
And I think a lot of it comes from marketing that has come from large commercial manufacturing, companies who have marketing budgets and the ability to kind of tell a story. But the reality as an end user is that there are a lot of things that are kind like I've already kind of described.
Needing to actually have all that extra weight to be able to perform, cut and, and, and I guess make the work easier. I think that weight is being sold as helping to ease the work that's getting done and cutting through food and that's not necessary. What they're doing is they're selling the limitations of the manufacturing processes as features more than anything.
And yeah, I think, there's a massive opportunity for education both on the user end as well as honestly for the knife maker end. And I think [00:31:00] I've tried to do a lot of work to do that to help people better understand, from my perspective and my background, what makes equality not yet, because thankfully there are a lot of people interested in very well made hand, handcrafted knives, culinary knives especially.
And there aren't that many makers doing that right now. And even if they did, double tomorrow, there still wouldn't be enough makers doing it to help satiate that demand. Yeah. I do think that there should be more people out there.
Audience: So just to piggyback someone else, Yeah.
Can you maybe give, you don't need to name companies. Could you give an example of something someone like me would not know isn't a real feature but rather a limit on the manufacturing process that's being marketed as a feature?
Joseph: What's a characteristic of a knife marketed as a benefit That's actually not?
Mareko: I would say the story of being forged versus not forged or stamped out knives [00:32:00]
Audience Two: Printed, nice printed blade with, an aluminum for example, or,
Mareko: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, how they're getting the blade shape, is it forged, is it not forged? When it comes to the commercial manufacture process, there are some companies like Wusthof or Henkels or a lot of European companies who have the forged integral bolsters, but they're ultimately stamping the extra flange off around the material.
Because it looks just like a big blob more than anything. And then they stamp out the blade, or a company is just either water jet or laser or stamping out, using machinery to cut out the blade. But that's often been sold as like a quality feature when it's not actually necessarily important because it doesn't inform the kind of the organization of the molecular structure and the crystalline structure within that steel in the finished product.[00:33:00]
Because that can all be completely rearranged at almost any point along the manufacturing process, until you get closer to the finished shape. But before you get to that finished shape, before they start doing the finish grinding to make the blades nice and thin, you can still adjust that.
That's a thing that can be messed with. And how they're handling it up to that point is, I would actually be more interested in that, than whether the knife is forged or if it's what's typically referred to as stock removed or stamped out.
Joseph: So the industry has gone through COVID and like every other industry change occurred. We’ve just had an explosion of interest in handmade things, right? What’s the tale of handmade knives over the last eight years?
Mareko: Anything really?
Joseph: Totally different. Big time explosion. Lots of people came to the market. Knives were all over the place. Prices went up and we're on the other side of that.
Now there's a lot of handmade knives that just aren't moving like they used to. [00:34:00] And, how do you think about that? Is it a marketing challenge? Some of it would be the big companies having a bunch of marketing dollars to make you interested in some feature, right? Some of it can be something else.
How do you think about handmade crafts, finding their market?
Mareko: I think, I think part of the challenge for Makers has been that it was kind of easy because there are essentially a lot of people hanging around at home that had a lot extra discretionary income, who are also just getting into cooking and, seeing these flashy knives and these beautiful knives, but not necessarily knowing really what they were getting.
I think working off the assumption that what they were getting was gonna be good. And the reality is that there are a lot of makers out there that there's a lot of opportunity, like I was just saying, for improvement in regards to how they're making their knives. Not that they're not trying to do a good job, it's just they lack the understanding for pushing those knives further, to being the highest [00:35:00] performing tool that they possibly could make.
So I think, well, and also what's happened is, you know, people have gone back into the offices and that extra discretionary income isn't necessarily there anymore. And so I think also the challenge for a lot of knife makers who thrive, honestly, at least I could speak for myself, working in like a little cave all by myself.
They have to then turn around and put themselves out there and not only show their process and the tool and the products they're making, but try to help. Bring potential clients and customers along the journey of seeing how these things are being made. So it's not just a price point we're talking about, but we're talking about the story of that maker.
The history behind that goes thousands of years back, of this industry and this craft that leads to them making this thing for you to use in your kitchen. And having, trying to develop that relationship and that connection with potential clients and customers. But it's a tricky thing because [00:36:00] talking in front of a camera's a lot harder than it looks.
And people that do it, do it well. It looks very easy, but it's not very easy. See, it's, yeah. The security starts coming on. Yeah. And the way you talk and the way you sound all start coming up. Yeah. It's tricky.
Joseph: To make it, to sell it. Those are different skill sets. If you had to talk to yourself at 20 and you were headed into the knife world... do you have a failure you would wish for yourself early in your career as a lesson to set up the rest of a successful trajectory?
Mareko: I would've told myself to invest in Uber, early.
Joseph: Taxi medallions. See?
Mareko: Actually kind of to go back to knife makers, in regards to pushing the performance of the knives, one of the things that's really scary is culinary knives can actually, especially carbon steel or high performance stainless steel, can be pushed really thin, but how thin is too thin?
I think a lot of people just slowly kind of edge up [00:37:00] to that. And I'm actually thankful. I don't know if this is necessarily me giving myself advice early on, but I'm thankful that I was just, I had made mistakes on knives early on, and so I was like, all right, screw it. Let's turn this into an experiment.
And so then I started working on pushing that geometry, basically going off the cliff, doing some testing by abusing the knife really in a way that would never be used, in a kitchen, but chopping in the two by fours or into like aged antlers or something like that. This is really tough on a knife, no matter what kind of knife, but especially a culinary knife.
And then pulling that geometry back and then testing again, and kind of like trying to dial that in. And it's, I think, there are some things that I struggled with in regards to pushing those boundaries, but if anything, finding a way to push those boundaries earlier on and not to be afraid to make mistakes.
Because, the greatest wisdom that I would be getting in my understanding of these, how to make [00:38:00] the patterns, how to push that geometry, how to make the best knives that I know. Many come from making those mistakes.
Joseph: It's a fail forward.
Mareko: Yeah.
Joseph: Belief.
Mareko: Yeah.
Joseph: In 10 years, what kind of project are you working on that, when you're done with it, you're like, that's why I do this?
Mareko: Sure.
Joseph: Describe that project.
Mareko: I mean, I go back to those historical pieces actually, that I was talking about earlier. I would really like to get some pieces into some museums, and some articles written. I actually, what's kind of funny is like I understand how those patterns will work or be made, and I'm still, as far as I'm aware, the only person who's accurately recreated those patterns.
But, I have no use for them in my knife making because they present best in a symmetrical style knife, which would be like a sword or dagger, and I don't really make those, but to, to get something written about that work and developing or kind of rediscovering those processes and or those pattern [00:39:00] styles, and then kind of doing that work.
Then after that to start, I have many friends who are dagger makers who are sword makers and traveling and doing some teaching around the world, to help to spread the understanding of that approach. And then, like, letting them take it and do their own thing with it and see what happens.
But, I would love to have pieces in a museum. There are a few different museums where some of these swords are housed. I really thrive in the pattern development process. I'm a really good knife maker, but, the pattern making and pattern design and understanding of the material movement, is probably the thing I'm the best at, potentially in the world.
And I would like to do more work in regards to exploring those boundaries of the pattern developing process. And what are the real limitations right now? I haven't come anywhere close to finding anything like that. I actually don't hope to actually find them, but I want to be able to afford to take the time to develop that [00:40:00] process or those various processes and to explore those boundaries.
As well as trying to help teach other makers how to better understand how material moves and to create these unique ornamentations, on their blades. At least old school makers would do a lot of engraving, especially in non ferris metal, such as brass, copper, bronze, and they would do golden inlays or silver inlays and stuff like that.
And so I look at Damascus pattern development almost as a form of engraving work, but we're going through a forge welding process to develop these unique, interesting patterns to embellish the blades. And that speaks to a maker's unique, creative process as well as their skills, basically.
To be able to mold in, or I guess mold is not necessarily right, but anyways, forge these materials together in proper ways to still then, 'cause you're basically stressing the crap out of the material, and then still making a quality tool [00:41:00] out of it after, at the end of the day. Um, yeah.
Joseph: Earlier today we cut off a giant hunk of metal and then you made a marshmallow out of it. Yeah, like the press. Then pulled it out into an integral. Over 45 minutes, an hour, hour and a half. It was like, oh that moves? It was great to watch it transform.
Mareko: And that was a difficult material to forge.
It's just, it doesn't wanna move very nicely. 'cause of the chromium content.
Joseph: We can have a round of quick questions if you want. I'll start with mine and then we'll wrap up after that. Sure.
Top investment in your craft or your shop for under a hundred bucks.
Mareko: Ooh. Lighting. Yeah. Lighting's pretty crucial. I have actually started using single function LED rechargeable lights. On my respirator, I can clip them right on there and I could be in a completely dark room. But the way that my [00:42:00] respirator filters, the angle in that light shoots exactly where I'm looking, and it's still slightly adjustable up or down, but it's always shooting right where I need to be seeing.
And that lighting is pretty crucial.
Joseph: Yeah. Agreed. Anybody else… questions?
Audience Two: I have one.
Joseph: Go ahead.
Audience Two: Do you make just unique knives and is that your buddy's knife?
Mareko: This is my knife. I made that knife. And I'm actually getting an article, I'm working on an article, around that build and that approach because it is a very unusual and unique and possibly the first time that somebody's done that.
But in regards to that kind of thing, I don't know. I guess less one-off kind of pieces like that. I have kind of played with the idea of doing some sort of production work, either by working with a manufacturer or doing it in-house myself. Anytime my hands are on it, the more expensive it becomes.
So trying to [00:43:00] also figure out, you know, what's really important that I touch and what isn't important that I touch and figuring out how to bring that together into something that is more of an approachable piece because yeah, once they get beyond the performance of a tool, they become art pieces.
A lot of my work ends up becoming art pieces rather than just like the straightforward tool that they're meant to be or that they're made to be.
Joseph: Alright. Your question,
Audience Three: Have you found a damascus pattern you can’t reverse engineer?
Mareko: No, I haven't actually.
There is a maker named Nick who does really great work. But I refer to him as kind of like the Jackson Pollock of Damascus Pattern Designs because his goal is to make something interesting, but also make it so messy that you can't reverse engineer it. But for most work, most patterns, I can reverse engineer.
I can look at it and understand how it was made in a, like [00:44:00] usually under a minute, if not a couple minutes. Some of these guys got to see some of that process last year. Was that you calling me Sherlock Holmes of Damascus fan?
Audience Four: What is Damascus?
Mareko: Yeah, so Damascus, actually a lot of the knives here have Damascus on them.
Damascus is kind of an umbrella term, and it refers to essentially any steel that was sold. In the Persian capital city of Damascus. A lot of people will say, well, that only wootz is true damascus, which is an approach using crucible steel. So it's steel that's melted down into essentially like a little cake of steel and then gently and carefully forged out into bars of steel, and then knives are made from that.
Some people think pattern welded steel is not true Damascus, but all of them exist under this damascus umbrella term. It's just, is it crucible Damascus? Is it a pattern welded damascus, like that. There are also approaches where people are using powdered [00:45:00] metal, so metal that's been ground down to particular size, basically like a loose sand, sandpaper, kind of abrasive kind of size, and then you can consolidate it and put it through different forming processes and create really interesting, unique patterns.
In fact, people in the last couple years have been using 3D printing. To build forms and then put different steels in the different sections of the pattern. Then consolidate that because the 3D form burns off and what's left behind is the steel, and then you consolidate it and make a pattern out of it.
So it's basically, it's developing or manipulating the material, so it has a pattern of some sort that presents in an interesting way.
Joseph: Usually it's a ton of layers.
Mareko: The simplest approach can be like, basically like building up layers like in a croissant. But then when you get to mosaics, it's more like you're making a cane, or drawing out a bar of steel that has a unique pattern on the end, and then you cut off little tiles of that, like you're [00:46:00] slicing a loaf of bread, and then you lay that up.
So, the cross section of the bread where the interesting pattern is, is now facing out on the face of the blade, and then you weld those tiny pieces back together again and very carefully, you make a knife out of it.
Audience: Where, where do you go for instruction, feedback, criticism?
Mareko: I have some friends I talk to. But most of what I've learned, I mean, I'm actually still, I'm learning all the time, but most of, mostly it's from my own mistakes. I do gain inspiration from some people's work. Mostly just like doom scrolling through Instagram and seeing something like, Ooh, that's interesting.
But I think more than anything, I have a journal filled with drawings that, of patterns that I've still have never made, and it's, I've been drawing all these different designs over the last 10 years and I've probably only made 20 or 30% of them. I'm sure there's always something to improve [00:47:00] on in regards to my knife making.
But I really want to start transitioning into exploring these patterns or in the different patterns, well, pattern design, making approaches. And then my thing has been to teach people. The rising tide raises all boats. So like, but honestly I kind of, I kind of do it from a selfish standpoint because I'm like, this is a thing that I've developed and I've never seen anybody do this.
What will you do with this? And then I watch them. I'm like, yeah, that's interesting. Oh, I didn't think about that. And I'll take it back and I'll do something different and I'll iterate off of that. But it's like an upward spiral is what I'm looking for. And that's really interesting, intriguing to me. And also at the same time, I've come to really understand that the way I think about the way the material moves to develop these patterns is very unique and unusual.
And, I think, what is it? It's this, it's like a stoic, principle of kind of contemplating one's death. And it's like, what good is all of this that I have going in my head? If the second I walk out the door, somebody happens to be texting, goes off the sidewalk, hits me and I'm gone.[00:48:00]
And, and so over the years I've worked to share this understanding, so that it helps people along their journey of this craft. 'cause it's the work, the work's hard enough as it is already. And even if I, as a whole, like leading a horse to water situation, I could show you every single step of the process.
You still have to do all the workflow. So I say, this is how you do it, this is how I did it.
Good luck. I look forward to seeing what you do.
Joseph: The stoics, memento mori, right?
Mareko: Yeah. Yeah.
Joseph: We were chatting earlier and you were talking about ribbed sweaters.
Mareko: Oh, like cable knit. I see pattern design inspiration all over, whether it's in trees or flowers or wallpaper or carpets or drapes or cable knit sweaters or whatever.
I see. Or I see patterns in fish like the scales and the way the scales overlap each other. I see pattern, inspirations everywhere. And so I'm, I, that's another thing where I take things from real life and then [00:49:00] I, instead of it being like something I saw in my mind's eye, I'm reverse engineering something in real life, like a skull.
How do I... and then this one, of course, I like made it somewhat fantasy because it's got the devil horn on it. But like, how do I transform a skull that is a real life thing into a pattern element that can be put together in a meaningful way that represents that thing. And so just, there's always, there's inspiration coming from everywhere.
Joseph: It's a lot of fun. And sometimes I just need inspiration to cut an onion.
Mareko: Sure.
Joseph: Get a good one. Anybody else? Another? Yep.
Audience Five: You touched on a little earlier about how technology is feeding into these handcrafts. Do you see a role for AI?
Mareko: I think in regards to especially the manufacturing process. Say I want to get my own CNC router, but I don't have the knowledge and skill or understanding for writing a program, I could potentially [00:50:00] input into AI. How do I write a program through Fusion 360 to model essentially something I already do.
So it takes 90% of the way there so that when I assemble it to my actual project, I'm doing the last 10% of the actual really important part, which is the fit and finish of the thing. I think there is room for AI in that regard. But in regards to like, somebody who could have an action, like especially the commercial manufacturers, I'm sure they already have, some way that they're incorporating AI in regards to their quality control or the precision of their execution of their manufacturing process.
But, it's difficult to replace that or to replace it or fit into a hand made handmaking process or operation. But I do think there are places to do that.
And in regards to the pattern development, I think it would be cool to try to see if there's a way to like, I don't know, to use the AI to develop patterns, but at the same time it would have to go [00:51:00] through all the various iteration or I'd have to like program in or, or draw illustrations or show photographs of all the mistakes and starting processes and all of us like trying to figure out how to create all those inputs so that you could say, I wanna make a pattern that looks like a sailboat going through wherever, you know, the Greek Isles.
Then it could input that and be like, oh, you have to make all these different elements. You have to organize them in a particular way. You have to account for the distortion that the pattern is gonna experience, not only width wise, but lengthwise as it is drawn out and forged into the shape of a knife.
Those are all things that I just do on a pen and paper with, with a pencil and try to figure out as best as I can. I definitely did it with that one to anticipate the expansion the material was gonna go through so that in my block of steel essentially what I wanted my knife to look like or the pattern to look like in, in, in the finished piece.
Because if it started there, then I forged it out. It would become stretched and distorted in ways that would make it somewhat unrecognizable and also really frustrating [00:52:00] me. And so I had to kind of take all of those things in consideration. That's, I don't know if that's something you can plug into AI, necessarily, without making, maybe, those mistakes or If it can read my brain and Sure.
Yeah. He
Audience Six: Train AI. And the more you train it, the more it alerts your brain that you could almost train yourself with a coworker that pushes you. That's not cloning yourself, but just a pure person that knows the way you think.
Mareko: Yeah.
Audience Six: I was curious.
Mareko: Oh, it's interesting.
No, I think there's a lot of untapped potential for AI. But yeah, I look forward to learning more about it myself.
Joseph: Anything else? Other ones? One more.
Audience Seven: What are your top three favorite handle materials?
Mareko: Top three favorite handle materials? Yeah. I typically work with natural materials, wood, and I think my favorite woods to work with are, like a [00:53:00] California Buckeye Barrel.
It's a really beautiful, kind of blonde and bluish gray presenting, material. Oh gosh.
Even though I don't really use a lot of ironwood, there are some really nice ironwood burl materials that I've worked with in the past. And if you do it right, it looks, especially when you're holding it in light and looking at the figure of the wood, it looks like it's illuminated from the inside.
And I think probably one of my others, it doesn't necessarily have to be koa, but any kind of wood that has what is, what is referred to as compression curls. So there's, fiddle back or flame maple or something. Those are a lot of really consistent curls, but the compression curl has these tight peaks or valleys, depending on how you're looking at, and then it rolls a little bit and then it has it again.
And they're usually a little irregular, a little bit more open. But there's, they just have so much depth to them. And again, if you finish it properly, it looks like you're looking into a three dimensional surface. [00:54:00] Rather than just being perfectly smooth or flat in a way.
Joseph: Well, thank you for joining us.
Mareko: Yeah.
Joseph: And sharing your depth of insight, making knowledge, passion and engagement.
Mareko: Yeah.
Joseph: As we were chatting, hopefully you guys go with a different lens to your cutting board and you can bring some more joy to it along the way. New joy.
Mareko: Yeah. New joy for sure.
Joseph: Awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Mareko: I feel like I'm supposed to clap too.
Joseph: Thank you team.