On the California Renaissance Fair circuit, some booths have started selling "Willow" swords, and quite frankly, I can find nothing pertaining to the aforementioned Smith. I got to handle one, and while it struck me as an exceedingly small profile for the weapon advertised (as a "hand and a half", it was about 36" long overall, with a 1" wide blade :), it appeared to have good basic construction, and seemed that the edge was none the worse for the few hours of "Battle Pageant" it had seen.

The clown who owned it recited chapter and verse from the clown who sold it "...High Carbon Stainless Tool Steel, Cryogenic Tempered, blah blah blah...", you know, the usual non-sensical tripe they pitch the customer, and seemed to know very little about it's its maker, it's makeup or fabrication technique.

Like I said, the overall product was fairly clean, the blade seemed to exhibit a good amount of flex without being whippy, and the edge seemed an overall good hardness for light sparring. I'm willing to chalk up the useless data to the Salesman, and would be curious what other styles of pieces he does. The owner paid about $600.00 for it, which struck me as exceedingly high, especially for a lesser known maker, and I was curious if again this was the scoundrel selling it jacking it up artificially high (I've seen a booth charge $1200.00 for a $300.00 Hanwei before, and would not be surprised to find out it happened with this guy, too... :)

At any rate: Willow swords, any clues, experience or contact info?

Funny that it circles back to you, it did strike me as very reminiscent of your Banneret blade, in the handle and pommel profile... :)

Did you ever make a blade similar to the Banneret, but in a slightly smaller scale?

It may be a little larger than I remembed, and as many of these booths have inventory sitting around for years on end (5+ in many cases), it might very likely have been one of yours, perhaps sold through the Sword dealer grapevine.

Yeah, I was fairly confident that it was the salesperson blowing out his ear when all the aforementioned buzzwords were brought forth. I know a few smiths that do work in Stainless who will do a sub-zero quench to eek a few more Rockwell points out of the Hardening process, as well as many of the garbabe blade Charlatans out there actively descibe their materials as "High Carbon 440 Stainless Steel", so I'm pretty sure the salesman was making it up on the fly... :)

At any rate, if it is one of yours, I was impressed with the performance and finish, and salute you. If not, well, there's a mystery maker out there who is definitely influenced by your designs.

Thank you very much, and I look forward to seeing what comes out next, from under your hands... :)

Sincerely,
Matthew

P.S. Just curious, what is your preferred alloy, and what C scale hardness do you usually aim for? I didn't have any way to test this blade, but judging by it's performance (appeared flawless after several hours of good natured swatting with other blades) and what I've seen on the field in the past, I'd be tempted to say about it was about a 55?

Hi Mathew

It may very well be one of mine. It seems there are a few floating around in California that are being marketted as Willowblades. But most of them have been around for two to three years or more.......

5160 is the only sword steel I've sold swords of. I've experimented with 1065, 1084, and L6, but have found 5160 to work best for what I'm trying to do....... I've also experimented with cryo tempered blades, but there's nothing "out there" as the cryo added nothing worth noting, except it seemingly softened the blade a couple rc.

If its a blunt edged sword you're talking about, then its 52rc give or take 1rc..........