It’s great to see the CKG doing two shows per year again. While the August show will be held downtown again, the winter show is back at Four Points near the airport.

As is customary, I arrived early to catch up with old friends. Sure enough, Brian Tighe, Mike Mossington, Murray St. Amour, Christophe Derringer, Rod Cook, and Wolfgang Loerchner were all hanging out in the café when I arrived.

Wally Hayes arrived shortly thereafter.

Wally brought some great zombie spikes, including this all titanium piece

And one with glow in the dark handle….wow, third show in a row I find something to match my shoes…and the show hasn’t even started yet lol!

Another with black wrap.

And this beauty with silver dragon soldered on..Mike Mossington quickly snapped it up to add to his collection of Canadian makers

I liked Wally’s Sinn too…such great visibility..I miss mine but since the battery died I have to send it back to Germany to re-do the liquid filling. My Surefire / Luminox will just have to do in the meantime.

James Emmons, past winner of best show knives and on working his way toward ABS JS, had another stunning bowie with visible hamon.

Ok on to the Friends of the Guild pre-show…

Dayammm Murray White I LOVE that fur jacket! The hat and scarf are pretty cool too…I think you need shoes with Swarovski crystals like mine lol

Lots of familiar faces

Brian Tighe had the only tactical on display, a Tighe Tac

Another look at James’ fantastic bowie

Nice stag handled hunters from Mike Mossington

Murray St. Amour’s personal knife with ivory handle

Journeyman Smith, David Sylvester

Steve Vanderkolff once again had something with one of my favourite handle materials, mammoth’s tooth

Nathan Knowles with his usual attention to detail…

…Such as the copper rings around the pins

They had some food for us…

Although this wasn’t enough to satisfy our hunger so Wally Hayes, James Emmons, and I headed out to Zorro’s Steakhouse. Wow the last time I was there was with knifemaker Greg Lightfoot. Sadly my car is in the shop so I had to slum it with this 2015 C300 lol

I started with the Escargot

Followed by the house specialty, prime rib, Zorro’s Cut of course

Finally some crème caramel

I started the show by checking in with Wally to confirm I was keeping the zombie spike that he lent me for the pic with my shoes…lol…

Definitely one of the cooler pieces of the show, a homage to the movie Ninja Assassin complete with removable chain (manriki gusari)

Here is the sheath system

At Wally’s table I ran into knifeman7 who was receiving his awesome forged folder from Wally, complete with red carbon fiber scales

Knifeman7 was selling some of his incredible collection as well including this limited edition Ken Onion

Mike Obenauf framelock

Rod Olson with lightning strike Kevlar scales

Three of my favourites of the show were all at David Sylvester’s table…not only does this ABS Journeyman Smith know how to forge, he knows how to sharpen too! These knives were sharp! The chopper is modeled after knives that David uses in cutting competitions

Wicked forged throwing axe head

But I liked this tactical the best, I think (ok maybe tied with the axe)

Nice ambidextrous sheath design

More forged pieces from David

And from ABS Master Smith Christophe Derringer, who is always willing to share his vast knowledge

Next Brian Tighe..

This one reminded me of a gold tiger striped one Brian had a few years ago that I still regret not having bought

More from Brian

Including some of his collaborations with CRKT

Wolfgang Loerchner had five of his knives on display

As well as some German military knives

Too bad I did not get a chance to speak with Paul Savage

More fine forged knives from James Emmons, who as an engineer built his own power hammer!

Another of my show favourites was Murray St. Amour’s filet knife with damasteel blade and handle made out of a material that combines steel (aluminum) with synthetics. The red handle uses copper instead of aluminum

Murray also showed us a vintage Randall out of his personal collection, held here by Murray White

Who was busy in action shooting pics for his show review

Mike Mossington was set up next to Murray

Steve Vanderkolff had some of his new knives on display

As well as some of his knives owned by Russ

This striped Damascus pattern, which Steve had specially made, was one of the nicest knives of the show

Paul Bold

I really liked his Kris

This green scale material also stood out

As did Paul’s first folder

Nathan Knowles also had a Kris design

Along with some other very detailed knives on his table

I really liked the colours on this diamond wood

A few pieces from Murray White’s collection

More displays by other collectors

Ok off for some great souvlaki at Zet’s with Wally and waterfowler

I came back late at night to say bye to my friends…most knives were packed away for the night.

I hope they have a great show tomorrow.

Cheers.

RL