About the Shape - The Honesuki is a Japanese style boning knife. Originally designed for poultry and small animals like rabbit, it excels for many larger butchering and fish filleting work. It has a relatively thick heel for scraping meat from bones, and a thinner tip for precise cuts. You don't want to force this knife through bone, but it's perfect for cutting through cartilage and tendons.

About Manaka Hamono - Kisuke Manaka is a relatively young, 5th generation, blacksmith in Kasukabe, Saitama pref. Manaka-san didn’t like the dishonest way his father-in-law operated his business so he decided to become a blacksmith himself. He began making knives from scratch about 10 years ago, with nothing but a workshop full of equipment and no mentor. He is completely self-taught, yet he mastered techniques to forge-weld steels in house, even forge welding stainless steel which is no easy task.
Now he forge-welds everything in house, from hard carbon steel clad with soft steel, stainless steel clad with stainless, and carbon steel clad with stainless steel. The Shirogami #2 steel used in these knives is forge-welded in house by Manaka-san. This is a very traditional steel that can achieve incredible sharpness and has great edge retention, a favourite of more traditional blacksmiths.