“Coaxing the Soul Out of Stone, Fossil and Steel”
Where Steel Meets Stone
Photo © A. Madsen / Bardic Films
Each Santa Fe Stoneworks piece begins with a precision-made knife or cutlery platform sourced from one of our trusted manufacturing partners.
In our historic Santa Fe workshop, our artisans assemble each knife and handcraft, fit, shape and polish its handles and inlays. Materials are carefully selected for their natural beauty, character and ability to tell a story.
Our collections feature materials such as turquoise, lapis lazuli, mother-of-pearl, abalone, fossilized mammoth tusk and tooth, dinosaur bone, meteorite, stabilized wood and other rare materials gathered from around the world.
Because these materials are created by nature, no two pieces are exactly alike. Every variation in color, pattern and texture becomes part of the finished design, giving each Santa Fe Stoneworks knife its own individual character.
What Is the Santa Fe Stoneworks Process?
Rock Cutting
All rock and shell are bought in their raw form and cut to the desired shape on a bank of diamond saws ranging from 6 to 10 inches in diameter. Choosing the prettiest stone or shell is very important at this stage, because “if a stone is ugly, you can do everything right, but it is still ugly. If it is beautiful, you can do everything wrong, but it is still beautiful.” The best, of course, is what we strive for: beautiful stone executed beautifully!
Assembly
Here is where the real art is. All stone and shell are hand-sanded and hand-fit onto a panel. The panel is then sanded and fitted for the particular knife and clamped down on the knife with a proprietary adhesive. Designs are pre-planned and executed by craftsmen who have worked here, some for over 28 years.
Hafting
Hafting is the process of shaping the handle to conform to the shape of the knife. The handle and knife are actually finished at the same time. We use many different types of grinders and flat sanders to achieve this. It is very satisfying to take a knife blank with a bunch of stone and shell glued to it and bring it to life through the hafting process.
Finish
After the knife has been hafted, we do a quality check for chips, cracks, or flaws in the stone. Repairs are made, and the knife is then made ready for polishing on several Scotch-Brite machines. The polishers are 30-inch muslin wheels with jeweler’s rouge for the finish polish. The knife is then steam-cleaned to remove any debris left from the process. Finally, in quality control, the knife is inspected and oiled, made to “walk and talk” (open and shut correctly), and bagged for shipping.
Beautifully handcrafted handles and aesthetic options are what made Santa Fe Stoneworks famous. Please note: for affordability, all handles are one-sided unless otherwise specified. Most models can be made double-sided for a reasonable 30 to 50% per-unit markup. Remember that our custom handles are painstakingly made by hand with the human touch, never created by machines in large factories.