Australian Knife Making Awards 2021: Heads-up for May!

Australian Knife Making Awards 2021 - recap from 2020

In May 20201 the biggest online knife making competition in Australia is happening again!

Full details will be posted on the Australian Beginner Knifemaking Group: LINK

Start planning for taking part, this year will be bigger than ever!

In short, the knife has to be completed within the month of May, and submitted online the last weekend of May 2021.

Here is a quick look back at how it went in 2020 and some of the knives that were entered;

5 Categories; 3 Beginner, 2 Open categories
Trophies and Prizes to Top 3 in each category

The Australian Knifemakers Guild were the judges of all 5 categories, putting in a great effort judging against criteria borrowing from their own assessment for Guild membership, scaled down to be from only seeing a couple of photos.

The judges were Christian Mathieson, Karim Haddad, Shawn McIntyre, Adam Fromholtz and Andrew Blomfield, all full members of the Guild who spent hours inspecting the submitted photos not only to provide a score - but often to provide practical advice on how to improve aspects of the knife that were sent back to the maker.

A key element of the Awards is that the makers themselves have to classify for "Beginner" or "Open" categories;

The Beginner categories are for makers who have never exhibited at a knife show before, or is not a member of the Australian Knifemaker Guild or "is not already making knives with advanced elements". That last one is a bit hard to pin down and each maker has to enter where they see themselves being.

The below "Best in Show" category is an Open category, and was won by Jason Ellard from Tasmania. The price is a table paid at the knife show of the maker's choice and Jason won with a beautiful integral hunting knife made from his own damascus steel.