Pattern welded seax from Michael Pikula arrived! -- myArmoury.com

Tim Lison

Wow! I just received my new pattern welded seax from Michael Pikula. What a beauty! It has a series of four grooves/fullers on either side along with bronze inlay. The grip is leather over wood with silver wire and bronze pins. It is gorgeous! Here are the stats:

OAL 30inches
BL 22.5inches
Blade width at grip 1.75inches
POB 6.5 inches
Weight approx 2pounds

I couldn't be happier with this piece. It's the 3rd seax I have from Michael and it is really impressive. The pattern welding with the inlay is masterfully done. The "dags" on the inlay coincide with the "waves" on the pattern weld. Just marvelous!

Darrin Hughes · Posted: Thu 26 Feb, 2009 2:03 pm Post subject:

I'm guessing that you're quite pleased with this one Happy

That is one of the most beautiful pattern-welded blades i've seen for a long time.

Congratulations on a great looking piece.

G Ezell · Industry Professional

Wow, that's a beauty. Michael is making some very nice saxes, congratulations to Michael for the sale, and to you for the tasteful purchase... Cool

Jeremy V. Krause · Posted: Thu 26 Feb, 2009 3:42 pm Post subject:

Gosh Tim,

That's beautiful. I especially like the the inlay as it looks so clse to period originals.

Jean Thibodeau · Posted: Fri 27 Feb, 2009 12:46 am Post subject:

Incredibly impressive and if Michael can manage to survive during this economic downturn and keep making such high quality work I think the demand for his work will grow tremendously as people get to know his work. ( Get them while they are affordable if you can afford it at all ....... sort of the problem at the moment ).

Nathan Robinson · myArmoury Admin

The piece as a whole is nice, but it really must be said that the blade on that one is just phenomenal. Really, really great.

Michael Pikula · Industry Professional

Thank you very much for all the positive feedback! I really consider this my first commission and I really enjoyed the challenges of sticking to an idea and a concept instead of "working with" the metal to see where we arrived. Tim is wonderful to work for as well, I enjoyed portraying my progress to him and want to incorporate more of process and creation of the piece on future commissions.

Once again, thanks for all the wonderful feedback!

Matthew G.M. Korenkiewicz · Posted: Fri 27 Feb, 2009 7:37 am Post subject:

A nice piece, for sure. Although I'm not a fan of this style of blade, let alone pattern
welding -- and forgive my ignorance but this strikes me as more of an exercise in
a maker's skill. So perhaps you or Michael can offer an insight to your fascination
first with said style of blade, and then pattern welding ?

A morning's curious mind would like to know. B-)

Michael Pikula · Industry Professional

Hi Matt,

As I try to push my pattern welding forward I find that the shape of the seax is an good way to judge my welds and pattern development compared to spending many hours with the more complicated geometry of a sword. This is the third blade that was made for this commission, the other two had failed welds that showed up during the inlay process and or heat treat. Also I have really enjoyed making the smaller seaxes and have been wanting to scale up the size of my work, so this project fit the bill of what I was looking to make. When I started looking at the larger seaxes, most of them have elements of finer fullers and some sort of decoration so I tried to come up with a combination that worked together, and drew on elements that we find in surviving originals.

The flow of the twisted bar was borrowed from an original and I have been wanting to try my hand at it so I incorporated that into the design, most seaxes had a mono edge, so I took that element, instead of using wrought for the spine, I decided to do a laminate which is a modern element but that is how I decided to proceed. The decision to do an inlay is something that I have wanted to do for a while, but never really had to opportunity. I took all these elements and let them stew for a little bit and came up with this design, although the original concept of the triangles hitting the dips in the twisted bar was not planned, but happened by a happy accident on the second blade, so I had to make the third blade flow to match the dips at some what of a regular interval while still looking "organic"

As for being an exercise of a maker’s skill, I sure hope it is! I feel that every piece should be an exercise in ones skills, every work should try to push the maker further and every work should strive to show something new and fresh. Even if this freshness is not in terms of a historical context, it should be at a personal level. When I get caught up in tasks that are the "norm" it is not that I tend to get bored, but I start to feel like here we go again. By pushing myself and faced with doing things twice or more it adds a certain sense of adventure and desire to burn forward throughout the day. Pattern welding is something that pushes me every time I light the forge up and start preparing my material. I feel that pattern welding at least for me, increase my forge time, to balance out the grinding and finishing time, and also has been my driving force toward where I am today. Being almost entirely self taught, I am very proud of where my pattern welding is today and without trying to sound full of myself, I like to show it off the best I can. Also for me making a piece pattern welded really showcases a certain historical flare as living proof that this is not just a piece of steel that I ground into a blade, I hope that by seeing the patterns someone can feel the actual work that went into the piece. Eventually I will reach a level where I will be pushing myself on a more subtle level, and in term of design, or concept, or any other number of factors. Right now I am focused on trying to become the best well rounded maker that I can become. I want to make a type XIV just as good as a wrought iron backed high steel edged seax, or a Illerup Adal spatha, all up to the same level of quality. I hope that by pushing myself, and never being in a comfort zone, I can reach my goal of being able to provide the best work I can, at the best price I can to the community.

Tim Lison · Posted: Fri 27 Feb, 2009 9:50 am Post subject:

Patrick Kelly · Posted: Fri 27 Feb, 2009 10:11 am Post subject:

Congratulations on the acquisition Tim, and congratulation Michael on an awesome piece of work. I personally love the seax as a style and I'm glad to see it executed so well. The pattern welding is very nice but the grip detail is equally well done. This one needs a nice sheath with metal mounts and tooling.

Patryk Nieczarowski · Industry Professional

it is really splendid thing Michael Happy

....very nice really

Tim Lison · Posted: Fri 27 Feb, 2009 2:54 pm Post subject:

Matthew G.M. Korenkiewicz · Posted: Sun 01 Mar, 2009 12:54 pm Post subject:

Michael P. --

I appreciate you taking the time to reply to my thoughts. I have always found it
interesting to read what maker or craftsperson has to say with regards to their
work, or specially to a commission as such might often challenge their personal
interests, discipline, determination, skills, and even work habits. I think anyone
who ever enters into such an association hopes and prays the person they're
working with possesses the essential qualities to see a job to the finish, and
do their best in doing so ...

Tim --

I certainly understand what you mean. And also appreciate you taking the time
to reply to my thoughts. It appears you found a kindred spirit to produce your
piece, so a successful execution all the way around ...

Another thought fried up in my brain pan --

I probably could knock around here and find the answer, has pattern welding been
a practice of makers since " olden times " if you will, and are there particular sword
types that are best suited to its use ?