On this July 4th we want to wish everyone (even our British customers ;-) a happy Independence Day! In today's video blog we highlight a few of the reasons you should care that all of our products are made by us at our workshop in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.
Chris Poor forging a custom spearhead
We are a small workshop of about half a dozen folks for whom making the most historically accurate, highest quality swords and weapons is a vocation and a passion. We've been doing this for forty years, and we look forward to making you swords and other weapons for decades to come.
Cutler extraordinaire Mark Black making daggers
Our supply chain and business partners are local and contribute to the livelihoods of our neighbors, city, state, and country.
Nathan forging the curve into a dussack trainer
(color is weird in photo, but still cool)
Even if buying high quality, American-made swords isn't important to you in itself, there are lots of reasons to buy from a trusted, expert, local producer rather than having something shipped halfway around the world.
Fireworks over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis half a mile from our shop
As we all emerge from this unprecedented year we'd like to thank all of our customers for supporting us and our communities.Check out the video and have a great 4th of July!
Nathan Clough, Ph.D. is Vice President of Arms and Armor and a member of the governing board of The Oakeshott Institute. He is a historical martial artist and a former university professor of cultural geography. He has given presentations on historical arms at events including Longpoint and Combatcon, and presented scholarly papers at, among others, The International Congress on Medieval Studies.
Craig Johnson is the Production Manager of Arms and Armor and Secretary of The Oakeshott Institute. He has taught and published on the history of arms, armor and western martial arts for over 30 years. He has lectured at several schools and Universities, WMAW, HEMAC, 4W, and ICMS at Kalamazoo. His experiences include iron smelting, jousting, theatrical combat instruction and choreography, historical research, European martial arts and crafting weapons and armor since 1985