About Us

Jason Thiessen is the head cutler at Running with Knives.

He spent his developmental years in rural Manitoba in a farming community. The utility of a good blade was a part of everyday life in the family restaurant, or hunting and fishing. Moving to Nelson in 2015. 

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Always an artist, he transitioned to the metal medium in 2020 with the help of Community Future BC and has been learning ever since.  

Running with Knives is a artisan knife company based in Nelson BC Canada with a focus on stainless steel, but carbon steel and tool steels are also used. Whether your in the kitchen, in the great outdoors or need a functional edge in your day to day adventures, Running with Knives has a blade for you.

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Modern powdered knife technology has enabled some excellent edge retention, toughness and corrosion resistance in modern knife wear. Different alloys add specific qualities to different blades. 

Yes, people ask me if I have "seen that show". What I do is a bit different than forging. I do stainless steel stock removal. It is a machining process where a bar of known knife steel is shaped on a grinder by hand to form the blade. 

Stainless steel benefits from an oxygen free heat treat so it goes in a sealed envelope into a heat treat oven at a very specific high temperature range. It is quenched with aluminum plates instead of oil (though some can be oil as well).

Additionally many stainless steels benefit from a cryogenic treatment to increase hardness and retained austenite.  Then temper cycles to even out the stresses in the molecular structure of the steel.

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Handle materials are also ever expanding and exciting materials like crazy fibre, micartas, juma, and G10 are available alongside more traditional materials like antler and wood. 

Then finish grinding sheaths, blade finishes

 a dash of flair,  edges and voila , functional art!