Knives on television and in the movies have a way of both mesmerizing audiences and giving a knifemaker’s career a much-needed boost—and such could be the case with the double-bit axe bladesmith Arnon Kartmazov made for the hit TV show, Grimm. Read all about Kartmazov’s cutter and other knives of TV’s Grimm in the new issue of BLADE®, on newsstands now.

Kartmazov’s piece on Grimm is a rare double-TV coup for the Oregon-based maker, who also appeared on The History Channel’s Forged In Fire earlier this year. Where it will take his career is anyone’s guess but it sure as heck can’t hurt any.

Speaking of Forged In Fire, ABS master smith Joe Szilaski examines the show’s format of requiring contestants to make a knife in three hours. Can such a format really result in knives that “will cut,” as the show’s Doug Marcaida likes to say? Szilaski gives you his expert opinion on the subject in his story, “3-Hour Knives: Are They Legit?”

Job 1 of knives is to cut and, as Spyderco notes on one of its old steel charts, “Steel is The Heart of The Knife.”  (Right below that slogan on the same chart is “And Heat Treating is The Spirit.”)

The latest in steels is always a hot topic in the knife industry, but, when it comes right down to it, it’s the steels the companies use most on their newest models that should tell you which steels are most popular at the moment. Find out in chart form what those steels are and which companies are using them in “5 Hottest Blade Steels.”

Also this issue: the conclusion of Lonnie Kapp’s two-parter on Japanese swords of World War II; how tactical custom daggers are making a comeback; how its latest award-winning knives are transforming the American Bladesmith Society into an International Bladesmith Society of sorts; tests of big camp knives; and the latest in knives for law enforcement officers. Get it all and more in the new BLADE, on newsstands now.

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