Overview

Forged: Making a Knife with Traditional Blacksmith Skills by Paul White is a beautifully illustrated, straightforward manual that teaches readers how to forge a complete, functional knife using the same time-tested methods once practised by traditional blacksmiths. Across 132 pages and more than 150 colour photographs and drawings, White explains each stage of the process—from steel selection and forging the blade to shaping, heat treating, riveting, and sharpening—using only hand tools. The book’s centrepiece project, a frontier-style utility knife, serves as a model through which readers learn essential forging techniques, heat control, and fit-and-finish craftsmanship. Written in a conversational and encouraging tone, Forged is filled with “Tips,” “Notes,” and “Blacksmith Secrets” boxes that provide extra insight into real-world workshop practice. White’s emphasis on low-technology, affordable tools makes the book especially appealing for new bladesmiths, hobbyists, and teachers of traditional craft. Reviewers across the international blacksmithing community have praised Forged for its clarity, depth, and authenticity. Publications such as The Anvil’s Ring, Knives Illustrated, California Blacksmith, and The Hammer’s Blow describe it as an indispensable beginner’s guide, noting its effective presentation of core techniques like heat treatment, annealing, normalising, hardening, and edge quenching. Paul White—a practising blacksmith with over forty-five years of experience—writes not only as a craftsman but as a teacher preserving a vanishing tradition. His goal is to help readers honour the heritage of the forge while developing their own skill and confidence. Printed in hardcover (132 pages, 24 × 17 cm) and richly illustrated in colour, Forged is both a practical workshop guide and a tribute to the timeless craft of hand-forged knives.

Full Product Details

9781733325028

Table of Contents

Reviews

"""In 'Forged: Making a Knife with Traditional Blacksmith Skills', Paul White sets out to teach the beginner bladesmith how to forge a basic working knife, which he calls a frontier knife. He uses a low tech, by-hand method that he was taught by his mentors. He's organized and explains well in plain English how to accomplish this 12-15 hour project. The book starts with basic metallurgy, anatomy and geometry of a knife, hammer selection (rounding hammer recommended), and using the vise to straighten the handle and blade (heat and lock technique). There's a good section on the types of mistakes students make and how to fix them - including how he deals with the fishmouth seen in the cover photo. 'Forged' ends with instructions on heat treating, riveting a wood scale handle, polishing and sharpening. I think that the heat treating chapter is the best part of the book; explaining a confusing topic (to a beginner) in an organized, common sense way. There's information on annealing, normalizing, hardening, edge quenching, and several tempering techniques. Forged fills a niche; the beginner or intermediate smith who wants to get beyond stock removal and make forged knives using only hand tools. If you're in this category, read 'Forged'"". --Ira Wiesenfeld ""The Anvil's Horn"" ""Concise and simplified instructions along with the illustrations made for an informative and easy to follow plan. The injection of tips kept me wanting to read and learn more. The simple, yet effective layout of information and instruction made this an enjoyable read. A great source of tips and tricks for any bladesmith from start to finish. This book is a must read for up-and-coming bladesmiths. It inspired me to try my hand at an all-traditional knife build in the future."" --Lee Crawford, Professional knifemaker and winner of the Naval competition in TV's ""Forged in Fire"" in the tournament of the Military Branches ""Central States Metal Artisans Newsletter"" ""FORGED: Making a Knife with Traditional Blacksmith Skills is a great beginners guide to hand-forging basic, functional utility knives in the frontier style. It is full of useful color photos and drawings to walk you through the process, and it is laid out in an easy-to-follow manner. It covers steel selection, tools needed, forging techniques, heat treatment, making handles, and more."" --Tim Stetzer ""Knives Illustrated magazine"" ""I bought a copy myself a few weeks ago, and I was impressed."" --Bill Ganoe ""Arizona Artist Blacksmith Association"" ""I was immediately hooked by the writing style. This is an informative, easy-to-read, fun book. (It) is full of useful information that is good for any skill level. I highly recommend it."" --Mark Kochan ""The Anvil's Ring (official magazine of ABANA, the Artist-Blacksmith's Association of North America)"" ""One of the first observations is the quantity and quality of the photographs and drawings, easy to see what is going on and well reproduced in copy. Another feature is inserts scattered throughout the text titled: Tip, Note, Blacksmith Secret, each revealing a tidbit of information added in here and there to emphasize something in the text. The history of iron and steel is brief but accurate as is the explanation of the why and how of heat treating imparting enough information to make a usable blade without a lot of unnecessary scientific speak. The knife explained here is easily made without any expensive power tools, just hand tools. All in all I found this book easy to read and understand and a student of smithing with a bit of hammer skills under their belt should not have much problem producing a usable knife."" --Robert Timberlake ""The Hot Iron Sparkle"" ""The author provides an excellent blend of blacksmithing and knife making techniques and processes."" --Albin Drzewianowski """"The Hammer and Tong"""" ""The information here is excellent and well-presented."" --Walter Sorrells, Bladesmith and Sword Maker ""YouTube channel"""

"""Concise and simplified instructions along with the illustrations made for an informative and easy to follow plan. The injection of tips kept me wanting to read and learn more. The simple, yet effective layout of information and instruction made this an enjoyable read. A great source of tips and tricks for any bladesmith from start to finish. This book is a must read for up-and-coming bladesmiths. It inspired me to try my hand at an all-traditional knife build in the future."" --Lee Crawford, Professional knifemaker and winner of the Naval competition in TV's ""Forged in Fire"" in the tournament of the Military Branches ""Central States Metal Artisans Newsletter"" ""FORGED: Making a Knife with Traditional Blacksmith Skills is a great beginners guide to hand-forging basic, functional utility knives in the frontier style. It is full of useful color photos and drawings to walk you through the process, and it is laid out in an easy-to-follow manner. It covers steel selection, tools needed, forging techniques, heat treatment, making handles, and more."" --Tim Stetzer ""Knives Illustrated magazine"" ""I bought a copy myself a few weeks ago, and I was impressed."" --Bill Ganoe ""Arizona Artist Blacksmith Association"" ""I was immediately hooked by the writing style. This is an informative, easy-to-read, fun book. (It) is full of useful information that is good for any skill level. I highly recommend it."" --Mark Kochan ""The Anvil's Ring (official magazine of ABANA, the Artist-Blacksmith's Association of North America)"" ""In 'Forged: Making a Knife with Traditional Blacksmith Skills', Paul White sets out to teach the beginner bladesmith how to forge a basic working knife, which he calls a frontier knife. He uses a low tech, by-hand method that he was taught by his mentors. He's organized and explains well in plain English how to accomplish this 12-15 hour project. The book starts with basic metallurgy, anatomy and geometry of a knife, hammer selection (rounding hammer recommended), and using the vise to straighten the handle and blade (heat and lock technique). There's a good section on the types of mistakes students make and how to fix them - including how he deals with the fishmouth seen in the cover photo. 'Forged' ends with instructions on heat treating, riveting a wood scale handle, polishing and sharpening. I think that the heat treating chapter is the best part of the book; explaining a confusing topic (to a beginner) in an organized, common sense way. There's information on annealing, normalizing, hardening, edge quenching, and several tempering techniques. Forged fills a niche; the beginner or intermediate smith who wants to get beyond stock removal and make forged knives using only hand tools. If you're in this category, read 'Forged'"". --Ira Wiesenfeld ""The Anvil's Horn"" ""One of the first observations is the quantity and quality of the photographs and drawings, easy to see what is going on and well reproduced in copy. Another feature is inserts scattered throughout the text titled: Tip, Note, Blacksmith Secret, each revealing a tidbit of information added in here and there to emphasize something in the text. The history of iron and steel is brief but accurate as is the explanation of the why and how of heat treating imparting enough information to make a usable blade without a lot of unnecessary scientific speak. The knife explained here is easily made without any expensive power tools, just hand tools. All in all I found this book easy to read and understand and a student of smithing with a bit of hammer skills under their belt should not have much problem producing a usable knife."" --Robert Timberlake ""The Hot Iron Sparkle"" ""The author provides an excellent blend of blacksmithing and knife making techniques and processes."" --Albin Drzewianowski """"The Hammer and Tong"""" ""The information here is excellent and well-presented."" --Walter Sorrells, Bladesmith and Sword Maker ""YouTube channel"""

Author Information

Paul White has been a blacksmith for over forty years. The smith who taught Paul to make his frontier style blade was Gus Marie of Brownsville, Illinois. Gus simply called his blade a work knife and so does Paul. The knife industry romanticizes this blade style by calling it a ""Frontier"" or ""Bush Knife"". Gus was the last of an unbroken chain of blacksmiths, originally from France, who came to the Colonies before the American Revolution. Paul's other early mentors were Evan Cooper, an original cowboy from Utah that shod his own horses, made his own knives and branding irons, and repaired his own wagons; a real ""throwback"" kind of guy. The Deal brothers, Jim and Ben, both blacksmiths of Murphysboro Illinois, trained as rural smiths at Tuskegee College after the first Great War. They allowed Paul to ""hang around their shop"" helping out. Paul was also proud to have worked with Daryl Meier and Brent Kington of Southern Illinois University. Both men ushered in this modern era of blacksmithing and pattern-welded steel that we all enjoy. They too were an early and significant influence on Paul's traditional training and approach to blacksmithing. Paul has treasured his friendships with these ""old"" smiths as much as the lessons they taught. Relocating to Northern Illinois in 1978 Paul was instrumental in establishing, equipping, teaching and demonstrating at the smith shop at Midway Village Museum in Rockford, Illinois. For many years he taught classes in general blacksmithing, Colonial hardware and, of course, knife making. He now limits his teaching to individual smiths seeking that traditional approach to blacksmithing passed-on to him from those legendary smiths of the last century. He has learned what works and what doesn't in teaching others to build a knife. He has captured those old-time secrets in this book and wants to see other smiths enjoy traditional blacksmithing as much as he does. Paul is an old-time guy, teaching an old-time skill to make an old-time tool.

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