I forgot about August. Let's say we were on holiday, although we weren't. Either way August passed full pelt and we were catapulted into September before we knew it.  It being September, we got our virtual new pencil case and squeaky clean plimsoles and have started mentally preparing (I mistyped this as "metally" which is perhaps even more appropriate for a knife store) and list writing for the new school year and Christmas which is looming on the horizon. In short, there has been a lot of "new" this month and we are set to have even more newness on the horizon come October. This month we have been mostly...

1) CRUSHING on majolica and Portuguese Bordello Pinheiro ceramics. Yes, I know you can get this brand new but, in my humble opinion, the old stuff has a certain colour and quality to it which I just prefer. Fortunately there are still some amazing pieces of it floating around the ether ready to be snapped up for retro-plating adventures. Going with the "plants on pink" colour theme in the picture below.

2) SHARPENING like there's no tomorrow. Not just knives by the way. We can do scissors, axes (should you be the short of individual for whom an axe is essential), and anything with a removable blade. We hand-sharpen so you don't have to worry that you will lose too much of the blade or it will be scratched. If it's blunt, bring it down and we will give you our assessment. Below is Slow Split's axe.

3) EATING EVERYTHING - we are totally on board with the whole nose-to-tail eating movement and are keen to avoid food waste where possible but it is another thing to put this into practice. While I might have Little-house-on-the-prairie type aspirations to conserve, preserve and pickle, time gets in the way. One thing I can do is pesto/salsa verde/chimichurri. And these carrot tops were perfect. I picked the freshest ones and blitzed them with olive oil, garlic (admittedly too much but hey), and capers. Delicious and much better than slinging fistfuls of greenery in the bin (albeit the food waste bin). 

4) REBRANDING - "we sell... er... gin and knives?". We are definitely aware that the two outer ends of our business seem quite disparate.... does gin and knives have anything in common? I imagine there is a pretty big cross over between fans of both but at times it does make it hard to promote both in the same breath. With this in mind, we have set up a new instagram account to focus on all things gin, at @gin.etc. This allows us to wang on about botanicals and tonic and gins and gin and tonic in a dedicated forum. Take a look. 

5) STASHING a whole haul of Japanese antiques. We had a mad cap adventure up to Thirsk (not bad for people who don't typically go north of Watford) to take a look at a shipping container full of beautiful Japanese vintage stuff. There were purchases a plenty including, rather randomly, a bike.... 

6) THINKING stocking filler/small gifts. A lot of the things that we sell do cost a fair whack of money. Simply put, this is what hand forged knives cost and while they aren't cheap, they will last you a life time. That said, we also want to stock the smaller things that don't cost that much, are equally well designed and covetable and make the perfect small gifts or stocking filler. My personal peeve is going into a shop where I love the aesthetic and atmosphere but where any purchase is a significant wodge of cash. I like to start small and build up. We have been auditing our lower priced items with a view to adding and expanding pre-Christmas - watch this space.