Some people get the call to make knives later in life, or situate it as a side hustle for years before fully committing – but not Carley Perkins, founder and one-woman show at up-and-coming shop Darlington Edgecraft.
“I actually went down the rabbit hole in high school,” she tells us. “I would watch people making knives on YouTube, and I was like: I want to do that!” After high school, Perkins laid out the roadmap for what would eventually become Darlington. She went to school to become a welder, working with metal in a different way, as she saved up the cash for her first step into the knife world: an apprenticeship under Andy Roy of Fiddleback Forge.
For many enthusiasts, it would be tempting to prolong that apprenticeship as long as possible, enjoying working at a famous custom outfit. But Perkins was already envisioning a shop of her own. “I was ready to go the second I walked into Andy’s shop,” Perkins recalls. “I had been dreaming about this for a long time and already had a brand book. I think Andy was taken aback!” The stint at Fiddleback helped Perkins develop her approach to knife making, and appreciate the visual aspects of the craft. “I don’t think I’d be here today without Andy’s help,” she says. “One thing he taught me was that a knife should have sex appeal.”
And even though Darlington’s a young shop, there’s already a strong house style in place, a heady mix of modern quirkiness and humor with classic outdoors knife design principles. “It’s more than just practicality,” Perkins explains. “I like being a little silly with my drops.” Models have rock solid fundamentals, but also unusual color schemes and finishes, and boast names like Sugar Mama, Candyman, and the awe-inspiringly punny Leonard Skinner; last Halloween Perkins celebrated the (objectively best) holiday with appropriately macabre offerings, and Christmas saw what could very well be the knife world’s first Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer-inspired fixed blade. “I’m just a nerd through and through,” Perkins proudly admits.
As her shop gains speed, Perkins envisions scaling up her output – but not too much. “I want to expand, but I don’t want to lose the artistic side of things. It takes the life out of it.” New models are in the works, and potentially even folding knives some day – although Perkins says she will always see fixed blades as the core of the Darlington catalog.
An undeniable fact in the knife world is that there are more male knife makers than female ones. For a long time it was unambiguously viewed as a masculine profession, but as the times change, more women makers are leaving their mark in the field. Being a woman-owned and -operated custom shop is a point of pride for Perkins, and she says that, by and large, she has been welcomed with open arms in the knife community. “I got a lot of trouble for being a woman in welding. But I’d say the knife community has never given me any trouble. If anything it generates more interest.”
Darlington Edgecraft is about making great, long-lasting, beautiful knives, but its visibility is important for other reasons too; Perkins hopes that her example can help other young women find their calling. “Young women can do this. This is not something that’s off the table,” she says. “I want to show them that they have a voice and can do anything.”
Knives in Featured Image: [Top to bottom] Darlington Edgecraft Quicksilver, Sugar, El Toro
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