Made of 1050 steel, this bowie has been the result of many attempts at creating utsuri. Utsuri comes from the word "mirror" in Japanese and represents an elusive activity in the jigane. It looks like a shadow that follows the pattern of the bright hamon but just above from the location of the hamon. The handle is bocote and measures 6 inches. The blade has been polished with a hybrid method to bring out the activities and measures 11 and a half inches. The total length of the knife is 18 inches. The guard is slanted forward and flows with the lines of the carved handle and it is composed of a damascus steel seppa, followed by a wrought iron tsuba and a damascus spacer.

I have sat at two lectures given by Yoshindo Yoshihara, the Japanese mukansa smith. At both lectures he was asked how to make utsuri. He has previously stated that he can make utsuri happen any time he wants. His explanation was to create a temperature differential between the edge, the sides and the back of the blade. The edge should be at 750 degrees Celsius and the sides of the blade 50 degrees higher. In order to do so you must have such control of the heat treating temperatures that it appears to me that you can't eliminate the random factor out of this equation. Nevertheless, this time it worked. But many blades before this one did not. This blade also has many unusual activities in the steel. There is inazuma, hakikake, nijuba and beautiful ara-nie crystals.

This is the wrought iron guard

This is the damascus seppa

This is the damascus spacer

This is the carved bocote handle which has been partially stained to follow the design