Los Angeles Area Knife Stores

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Bruise Lee

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The title says it all. Can anyone recommend any good knife shops in the Los Angeles area? The only place I know of is L.A. Guns on Sunset in West Hollywood, which is really just a gunshop with a decent knife selection. Sometimes on less expensive knives it just doesn't make sense to pay $7 or more on shipping.

Bruise
 
Depends on how far you want to drive and where you're starting. Assuming you're a standard Angelino and freeways aren't a problem, I'd start at Recon1. It's a surplus store and they're located on Ventura Blvd in the San Fernando Valley and have a huge selection of production stuff as well as some customs. They're not far from teh 404/101 interchange and have everything from Spyderco, Benchmade,, AL Mar, etc. They're set up to automatically get a couple of each Benchmade limited edition that comes out, so you can find some pretty rare higher end production stuff. You'll also find stuff like Chris Reeves and William Henry high end production stuff as well as Pat Crawford and Alan Elishewitz originals. Maybe even some Bud Neely. I've even seen original Al Polkowski knives there. You never know what they'll have. Ask for Gary or Sako. Sometimes they can even get a little friendlier when green money is invloved instead of credit cards. Depends on how friendly you are.

There's also the Shaver Shop on Wilshire Blvd in Santa Monica and the Supply Sargent on Lincoln just around the corner. Haven't bought from either, but both had a reasonable production selection, although not like Recon 1.

If you're near the Lakewood Mall, there's a shop called Advanced Cutlery that does some Benchmade, an occasional Willliam Henry or Chris Reeve, as well as lots of CRKT and the like, but they're mall based and pretty much retail price only.

If you want to wander a little further from home and cross the Orange Curtin, Plaza Cutlery in the South Coast plaza is one of the finer knife shops you could ever hope to walk in to. It's a multi generation cutlery shop that not only features a great selection of production stuff, but also customs as well as some true art knives. I've seen some John W. Smith and Koji Hara stuff there that made me want to be really naughty with my credit cards. They also host a serious show every other year and are often at Blade West with a table. Dan Delavan is a nice guy and a pleasure to do business with.

While on the subject of wandering further from home, but in the opposite direction, you could also go north to Nordic knives in Solvang. Like Palza Cutlery, Nordic knives does a lot of production stuff, but the beauty of the store is their collection of customs (which are for sale). Almost half the store is dedicated to customs and limited high end production like Chris Reeve. Solvang is such a cool day trip from Los Angeles, it's worth the drive up the coast and a Saturday just to look. They also sponser a show which is coming up at the end of April and is unusual in that they only invite custom makers, no factory stuff. The show runs April 23, 24 & 25 and you can count on finding me there on Saturday the 24th..:) The area is surrounded by some well know wineries and it's worth considering as a nice weekend get away with that special someone (like my wife who bought me an original Hibben there last year!).

I hope that's a decent starter list for you. I'd love to learn about some others close by if anyone has some other ideas.

John
 
Speaking of Supply Sergeant, the one in Burbank is better stocked than the one in Santa Monica. Their address is:

503 N. Victory Blvd.
Burbank, CA. 91502
(818)845-9433

I recommend trying this place instead of the Santa Monica store.
 
I don't like Advanced Cutlery, even the knock offs they sell are overpriced!
 
if you come up to Solvang, you can visit Nordic Knives which has entire display cases stocked with customs. They also have the higher end prod. stuff, EVERYTHING. the people are amazingly nice, and actually sponsor the Solvang Custom Knife Show, which is in a few weeks.

nordicknives.com

Nitin
 
There is a very good one in downtown LA of South Broadway across the street from the Grand Central Market but the name escapes me at the moment. It is a dedicated knife store that even carries autos (for LE people only).
 
Forgot to add the most knife stores advertise in the Yellow Pages under Cutlery-Retail. Take a look there for stores local to you.
 
if you want spyderco collector's club knives, there's LA guns, their price is MSRP but they have two memberships for the spyderco collector's program so if you want a out of production spyderco, they will have it.

service is great there, it's a mom-pop shop (literally,), just be ready for sticker shock. they are on sunset right before the hustler building, if you are going east on sunset, it's on your left hand side, parking in rear and they validate, but keep an eye out, it's a little hard to find.
 
Hi guys I'm coming over for my first visit to the states in a few months and would like to buy a knife when I get to L.A.
It's kind of a tradition I have when I get to a new country. This is a pretty old thread so I thought I'd ask if you guys from L.A. Could give me any advice on where to find something nice? Thinking of getting another left hand sebenza. will be based somewhere around west Los Angeles and will be catching public transport to get around. Thanks for any advice guys :)
 
Thirteenth Star said:
Speaking of Supply Sergeant, the one in Burbank is better stocked than the one in Santa Monica. Their address is:

503 N. Victory Blvd.
Burbank, CA. 91502
(818)845-9433

I recommend trying this place instead of the Santa Monica store.
Click to expand...

Literally grew up behind that place right next to the Burger King. You're right, that place is pretty decently stoked. There's also another place in Burbank that had a pretty good selection of benchmades. It was some sort of tactical store I believe in Burbank blvd.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
South of LA, Plaza Cutlery is still there. Two months ago they had a large selection CRK, lefties included. I'm not much help for West LA.

Also, there's no practical public transportation between West LA and this region of orange county. You would need a rental car and patience for the freeway.
 
I live in North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley.

Supply Sergent in Burbank - ....ehh, small collection of some Spyderco, Cold Steel etc. Not recommended. They do have two awesome Parrots that talk a lot.
Ross Cuttlery, Downtown - Large selection of many brands. They own ProTech knives
Recon 1, Tarzana - My favorite shop. Large collection of CRK, Benchmade, ZT, Emerson etc. They will match some major online shops.
 
shaztec said:
Hi guys I'm coming over for my first visit to the states in a few months and would like to buy a knife when I get to L.A.
It's kind of a tradition I have when I get to a new country. This is a pretty old thread so I thought I'd ask if you guys from L.A. Could give me any advice on where to find something nice? Thinking of getting another left hand sebenza. will be based somewhere around west Los Angeles and will be catching public transport to get around. Thanks for any advice guys :)
Click to expand...

Here you go: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...outhern-California-Knife-Stores-and-Companies
 
also, i'd think twice about not renting a car. Los Angeles is too large of a city to try to rely on Public Transport to get around.

if you don't have a driver license, Uber & Lyft are reasonable alternatives during non-peak hours
 
Thanks for your advice guys much appreciated. I might try to get an uber to recon 1 and maybe con my bro into driving me to plaza cutlery if recon 1 don't have anything good. I've heard "everyone drives" in L.A. But driving through crazy freeway traffic when I don't know where I am or where I'm going while driving on the wrong side of the road sounds a bit stressful for a holiday haha. Thanks again :)
 
shaztec said:
Thanks for your advice guys much appreciated. I might try to get an uber to recon 1 and maybe con my bro into driving me to plaza cutlery if recon 1 don't have anything good. I've heard "everyone drives" in L.A. But driving through crazy freeway traffic when I don't know where I am or where I'm going while driving on the wrong side of the road sounds a bit stressful for a holiday haha. Thanks again :)
Click to expand...

LA is easy to drive.....the 101 sucks because of traffic. BTW, where are you staying. Area?
 
shaztec said:
Thanks for your advice guys much appreciated. I might try to get an uber to recon 1 and maybe con my bro into driving me to plaza cutlery if recon 1 don't have anything good. I've heard "everyone drives" in L.A. But driving through crazy freeway traffic when I don't know where I am or where I'm going while driving on the wrong side of the road sounds a bit stressful for a holiday haha. Thanks again :)
Click to expand...

Shaztec,
You can check Recon1 website for their inventory. And/call them. It might save you a trip.
 
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