Atlanta Cutlery recently added a line of "japanese" style blades made by Zhou Zhengwu's Institute. Can anyone enlighten me as to their relative quality? Thanks.

You will have to forgive us for the complete dearth of replies. I can't speak for everyone, but I know for me personally that the flood of chitanas has gotten so big that I no longer really even try to differentiate between them. :blush:

Another factor that may explain limited replies is that this site tends to focus more on European arms and armor.

I don't have any personal experience with any of Zhou Zheng Wu's work. I know that he was one of the artists whose work was on display at the Masters of Fire International Contemporary Blade Smiths Exhibition in Macao a couple of years back. Here is a link to some information about him: Masters of Fire - Zhou Zheng Wu Biography. FWIW, the biography does mention that he founded the Zheng Wu Sword Forging Institute in 2002. He seems to be highly regarded as an individual artist, but that doesn't necessarily say anything about the quality of production pieces made by his 'institute', or those particular items offered by Atlanta Cutlery.