Archival Field Trip: NYC/Brooklyn (Pt 1)

Bobby Short portrait at the Cafe Carlyle. Soon after we landed we headed over to the Carlyle for a dinner show featuring OFAM favorite, John Pizzarelli and his wife Jessica Molaskey. Jonathan Schwartz was in the audience.

Tom, Sara and I breakfasted in Brooklyn with Matthew from the William Brown Project.

Pratt campus. We wanted to see to whence Tom has disappeared.

Visit with Emil and Sandy, the kind and creative gents behind Hickoree's/The Hill-side.

Some Hill-side wears with Brooklyn view

Exemplary packing station

Sara and Tom inspecting a Stanley & Sons conveyor belt tote

Brooklyn transport

Brook Farm General Store. Our Chaz would enjoy being a shop dog.

In constant transit. Footwear report to follow.

I emailed with this nice gent about places to stay in Brooklyn. We ran into him--by chance--at the restaurant he manages, Marlow & Sons. In addition to serving food, they sell woven towels and Armor-Lux apparel.

The Brooklyn Kitchen. Tom and Sara browsed the pickling supplies. I obsessed over the MKS Design paring knife on the left.

We stopped by Epaulet to check out their new Thorogood farm boot and Vanson for Epaulet waxed cotton motorcycle jacket. Lots of foot traffic in the shop.


A few doors down from Epaulet, we made a quick visit to Smith + Butler. Tom checked the fit on a Pointer chore coat. Just out of the frame, a reality TV couple browsed the inventory of nautical scarves, Barbour jackets and American workwear.

An all-important, end of day pause for cured meats at Los Paisanos meat market.


NYC/Brooklyn field trip, part two, coming next week.

Archival Pocket Knives

A.C. endorsed Opinel (Tom's model)

Discontinued Victorinox (L.L.'s current pocket folder)

I've been shopping for another knife ever since I saw a gent in Seattle cutting leather straps with a self sharpened Randall's Adventure knife.

Unauthorized obsession

Tom and Sara both say NO to a jungle survival knife. Admittedly, I'm not sure what I would use it for save for opening boxes or cutting up cured salamis. A Randall would be overkill for my needs since it would spend most of its life in a kitchen drawer (too large for daily carry).

My second choice would be an Oregon made knife by the William Henry studio. Back in the day, I used to catch and release these from the display case of our favorite, now closed cutlery shop in Portland: George & Son Cutlery. A staff member once described William Henry as the CC Filson of pocket knives: high level of workmanship, local production, best quality materials. At the time, William Henry issued fewer, special edition knives and the lower end of their price point was still semi affordable (though painful enough that I never made a purchase).

William Henry pocket folder

Another pocket folder from Oregon's Lone Wolf Knives

I've asked Tom to suggest some alternative folding knives to William Henry or Randall for daily use. Although he's steadfast in his support of the Opinel as the best bang-for-buck user knife, here's what he selected from Garret Wade's knife counter:

Tom is very fond of this brass Japanese folder, since it reminds him of his beloved scribing knife.

Sheepsfoot blade German-made Sailor's knife.

The famous French Douk-Douk. Featuring a Duk-Duk spirit from Papua New Guinea on the handle. The other Opinel, in a sense: very popular with the FFL and throughout the French Colonies (although I didn't find one in Morocco).

The safest option that Tom approves for Lesli's use.

For fixed blade knife users, try making your own. It's a basic process of finding a blade and mounting a handle. Here's one that Tom made for his timber framing teacher.

Tom's own custom creation