A Modern Guide to Knifemaking: Step-by-step instruction for forging your own knife from expert bladesmiths, including making your own handle, sheath and sharpening

by Laura Zerra

In A Modern Guide to Knifemaking, survivalist Laura Zerra, one of the stars of Naked and Afraid on the Discovery Channel, shares her essential knifemaking tips and tricks, including step-by-step instructions for both forging and stock removal.

We all use a knife pretty much every day, but for Zerra, her daily life often depends on the blade she takes with her into the wild. She's learned about what works and what doesn't, what steel will hold an edge, and what nuances in blade design will make or break a knife.

From design to sharpening, A Modern Guide to Knifemaking covers every step in the knifemaking process. To begin, you will consider what you want your knife to accomplish, develop a design, and make a prototype. Zerra takes you through choosing and buying steel for your knife and then teaches you to build your own forge. You will learn forging basics and then move on to forge the shape of your knife and make the blade tip. From there, you will cut the blade profile, grind in bevels to make the edge of the knife, heat treat and temper your blade, grind and polish it, and make a handle and sheath for it. You will also learn sharpening techniques to maintain the edge of your new knife.

Throughout, Zerra has included Pro-Tips from some of the leading knifemakers working today including Ken Onion, Kaila Cumings, and Mike Jones.

A Modern Guide to Knifemaking covers every detail of knifemaking so you can make yourself the perfect knife.

160 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 3, 2018

Reviews

[Daniel Mihai Popescu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent manual; as a bonus, some practical advertising for her cool knife maker friends, making it a compendium of rich advice :). Very nice and lightly written, one doesn't have to be a metallurgist to comprehend the unavoidable technicalities. I would have preferred more pictures.

[john Calkin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like this book a lot. Zerra puts the emphasis on making your first knife, not so much on setting you up for a business. This offers beginners the opportunity to start cheap. There are good instructions for making a two-brick kiln as well as heat treating in a campfire using a hair dryer as a blower if you wish. Memorizing the knife maker hip talk as it comes up will help readers understand later instructions, and the same goes for the sheath-making section. The advice from other experts is brief and usually more philosophical than direct, but that was OK with me. I'm sure I could make a knife using this book. I would skip the forging and use hand tools, though prices in 2024 for a commercial kiln and a belt grinder total less than $400 if you want to start out in deluxe fashion. That's cheap if starting a business is on your mind.

[kodie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Got me started

This was a very simple yet detailed enough book for a beginner to get started. I was also motivated to get started even with minimal equipment because Laura would mention the bare minimum you could use for each process. Her language or writing style has a nice flow and she kept the wording simple so it was understandable. I loved it and now I'm a part time blacksmith thank you!!!

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book and introduction to bladesmithing. One item I like is that the author focuses on different steps. A lot of snobby folks will say go start off hammering hot steel but actually your first blade can be perfectly fine via stock removal. Highly recommend this book