Graham took Basics last Fall and came back for Simple knives.

He didn't have a simple knife in mind.

Because he was the only one in the class, I decided to let him go for it and make an integral-bolster, full-tang, slab-handled knife.

The upper pictures are what he had at the end of the class. He took it away and ground and filed it to profile on his own time. It was then that he chose to turn it around and make a partial-tang knife with a longer blade.

He brought it back and we used the flatter on the 'new' blade. He filed and ground and drilled it then hardened and differential tempered. The scales were pinned and epoxied on and the whole thing sanded to final form.

Not bad for a first knife.

(The camera registers infrared as lavender.)