Portland’s Best Knife Shops and Sharpening Counters

As seniors at Cleveland High School in 2004, my nerdier friends and I would frequent the newly opened Hawthorne Cutlery. It’s a bit of a misnomer unless you consider zweihänders and naginatas cutlery—the shop sells kitchen tools and sharpens knives, but its primary focus is swords. The katanas particularly enthralled me, their curved blades shimmering with waves of pounded steel. Despite surly personas, the staff was patient, letting us handle the more pedestrian weapons, if not the eighteenth-century samurai swords.

While can you still visit Hawthorne Cutlery for a new implement or sharpening sesh, the shop now has competition (though not when it comes to edged weapons). In a city full of chefs, artisans, and fantasy nerds, Portland’s blade obsession has only grown in the past 20 years. Portland Knife House’s founder, Eytan Zias, worked as a chef in New York and Arizona before realizing his favorite part of the job wasn’t prep or service but sharpening knives. That passion turned into two locations of Knife House, with the Portland branch opening in 2015 (the other is in Phoenix). It boasts an array of gleaming steel, including products from Zias’s own Portland-made brand, Steelport Knife Co. Steelport’s stunning carbon steel knives blend softer steel for the spine of the blade with a hard cutting edge that retains its sharpness better than stainless. Each knife is fitted with a unique Oregon maple burl wood handle, so customers visiting Steelport’s Laurelhurst production shop can select the pattern they vibe with most.

Zias isn’t the only scrupulous smith in town. North Portland’s Bridgetown Forge comes from Arnon Kartmazov, a bladesmith who apprenticed in Japan under knife- and sword-makers before opening his own shop in Kyoto. Since 2000, he’s managed forges in Portland, opening Bridgetown Forge in 2010. Kartmazov brings his experience in Japan to each knife he makes, as well as to his series of weekend classes. Attendees can learn how to make everything from spoons to knives and even swords, which they can take home to display above their mantel.

For true Japanese-made excellence, NE Alberta Street’s Seisuke Knife cuts above the rest. Founded by Atsuhiro “Hiro” Nakamura in 2016, the shop offers an impressive roster of Japanese chef knives, cleavers, paring knives, and other kitchen blades. Most prices hover in the low- to mid-hundreds. Those looking to flex on their dinner guests can find knives crafted from tamahagane—an exceedingly rare form of Japanese steel flecked with jewel tones—in a case next to 30-inch tuna knives and, naturally, samurai swords. Even the most serious knife sellers can’t resist the appeal of a katana and wakizashi set.