a cleaver huhh,
that could be fun, I've never made a cleaver.
Yeah I think that gyutos and slicers normally get all the attention as their the "sexy" knives, but I think that Chinese style thin cleavers are a lot of fun. I also like the straight edged Japanese knives like nakiris and usbas. However, I often find nakiris to be a little on the small / short side and usbas to be too thick and chuncky to work as all rounders.
I've often thought that it would be cool to do a kinda cleaver / gyuto hybrid: Something with more straight edge than a gyuto, but also with more length and alittle less height than a cleaver.
I actually just came across this:
http://www.chefknivestogo.com/takedamenkiri.html
and I'm seriously thinking about picking one up just out of curiosity. My only reservation is that I've heard that some of Takeda's blades are pretty brittle.
Another interesting shape might be something like a kiritsuke, which might have broader appeal as it's still got a tip / more of a knife-like shape.
Anyway, I think that it would be really cool to take something kinda square and utilitarian and sexy it up with some really stunning metal work. I've been dying to get my hands on a 52100 or W2 blade with a nice differential "honyaki" style heat treat. Although, your sweet contrasty laminates would also look really sharp on a big broad blade surface like this.
Oh and one last thing to add in a completely different direction: there are very few really high quality western style boning knifes. Tojiro is, I believe, the only Japanese company making them. The only really nice custom example that I've seen was by Bill Burke (of course) .
http://www.bladegallery.com/shopexd.asp?id=88203
...or a filet:
Anyway, just throwing ideas out there. SO MANY COOL KNIFES; SO LITTLE TIME. I'm excited to see what you come up with.
