Yoshikazu Ikeda池田美和

The story

Yoshikazu Ikeda (池田美和, read いけだ よしかず) began making knives in 1967 under his father, a blacksmith, and set up on his own in 1983 as Ikeda Tanrenjo (池田鍛錬所), at 3-1-24 Kitatadeicho in Sakai-ku, Sakai, Osaka. The workshop's mark is 堺北辰, Sakai Hokushin.

His own page says he has carried on Sakai's forged-knife technique since then, making mainly professional Japanese knives such as water-quenched honyaki (mizu-honyaki) and suminagashi. In his own English he recalls starting out wondering whether he could get through that first summer staring at the red charcoal, and he calls his hands clumsy and stubborn, stubborn enough to hammer the metal again and again.

Sakai City's roster of traditional craftsmen lists him under 鍛冶, the blacksmith's trade, for Ikeda Tanrenjo. The national register records his certification for Sakai forged cutlery (堺打刃物), comprehensive division (総合部門), on 16 December 1988.

His page lists his honours: the national traditional craftsman certification in 1988, the Sakai City Special Contribution Award in 1999, the Kansai Bureau of Economy, Trade and Industry Award in 2004, and Osaka Prefecture's Master Craftsman in Naniwa (なにわの名工) award in 2014. Sakai City also named him a Monozukuri Meister in FY2001, and its Meister roster notes that he can make knives in a wide range of steels. For FY2020 the Sakai cutlery federation's award list records two more: a Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry award for service to the traditional crafts industry, and a merit award from the Japan Association of Traditional Craftsmen.

An Aoyama Square interview introduces him as born into a family of blacksmiths going back to the Meiji era, and Sakai Film Office describes the workshop as a four-generation Sakai forge. Tatsuo Ikeda is his elder brother.

The national register also records Ryoichi Ikeda (池田良一), certified for Sakai forged cutlery on 25 February 2008, and Sakai City's roster lists his workshop as 池田刃物製作所. Ryoichi is Yoshikazu's successor at the forge.