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Side view of the Kamo Hamono Juhyo santoku knife with purple stabilized figured maple handle, pale maple bolster, and a VG10 Damascus blade with hammered tsuchime finish across the upper surface.
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle
Kamo Hamono

Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle

Sale price$365.00

The Juhyo series takes its name from the phenomenon of hoarfrost on trees — the crystalline formations that appear when supercooled fog freezes on contact with branches and surfaces. On this santoku, that reference lives in the tsuchime hammered finish across the Damascus cladding: an irregular, faceted surface that shifts with the light rather than reflecting it evenly. The core steel is VG10, chosen for its edge retention and resistance to corrosion, layered within a Damascus body and ground to a double-bevel edge. Kamo Hamono has forged knives at Takefu Knife Village in Echizen City since the cooperative's founding, working within a cutlery tradition that the region has held for over 700 years. The handle on this version is stabilized figured maple, dyed purple, with a pale maple bolster — the color saturating deep into the wood grain without obscuring it. Each knife in the Juhyo series differs in handle material and finish. The blade is the constant.
Side view of the Kamo Hamono Juhyo santoku knife with purple stabilized figured maple handle, pale maple bolster, and a VG10 Damascus blade with hammered tsuchime finish across the upper surface.
Kamo Hamono VG10 Tsuchime Damascus Juhyo Santoku Knife Purple Handle Sale price$365.00

Meet the Artisan

Kamo Hamono

Kamo Hamono was established in Echizen City, Fukui Prefecture, in 1936, when Kamo Shintaro founded the studio as a kitchen knife forge within the Echizen Uchihamono tradition. His son Kamo Katsuyasu joined the forge in 1956, beginning with the technique of dual-bevel blade forging, and has led the studio as its second generation. In 1975, Katsuyasu co-developed a vegetable harvesting knife with a highland farmer in Nagano's Sugadaira plateau, producing a dual-bevel blade suited to the demands of harvesting leafy vegetables at scale. The knife spread to farming communities across Japan and became one of the pieces that established Echizen's reputation in agricultural blade-making. Katsuyasu has also been central to the institutional survival of the tradition. In 1973, as the forge-based industry faced declining demand and an aging workforce, he was among the craftsmen who formed the Takefu Forged Blade Industry Study Society. In 1991, he established the Takefu Knife Village Cooperative and served as its inaugural director, working to bring younger makers into the craft at a moment when continuity was genuinely at risk. In 2016, he received the Order of the Sacred Treasure for this body of work. He was certified as a Traditional Craft Artisan in 2008. The studio is now in its third generation under Kamo Shinsuke, born in 1981.