All About Pocket Knives

I am curious about what folks think about What makes a knife Rare. Just looking for different Opinions!

Is it the knife pattern?

Age of the knife?

Handle Material?

Quantity produced?

I have my own opinion on this but I wanted to see what your thoughts are!

Thank you,

Tom

I think everything you stated is accurate, additionally I would add the manufacturer. What goes along with rarity is value, just because something is rare does not equate to a high value, it needs to be desirable to have value. In addition to desirability it needs to have demand to have value, a really pretty, low production, with unusual handles, rare old knife that that carries a brand that name no body wants may be rare but may have a low value. Each individual may have different ideas about what makes a knife rare to them but in the world of collecting it is not rarity that drives most collectors but desirability and demand.

Chase wrote:I am curious about what folks think about What makes a knife Rare. Just looking for different Opinions!

Is it the knife pattern?

Age of the knife?

Handle Material?

Quantity produced?

I have my own opinion on this but I wanted to see what your thoughts are!

Thank you,

Tom

All of those boil down to just one thing, rarity (I think scarcity is a more accurate term) = Quantity produced / quantity still existing, available.

Or as the dictionary defines it (as applies to our hobby) ---> not found in large numbers and consequently of interest or value.

Now if you had value in the back of your mind, driving this question, it's ---> (in order of importance) *Desireability -- *Scarcity -- *Condition -- *Condition -- *Condition

Scarcity sums it up for me......

On the lighter side, any knife I would like to buy or trade for seems to become very rare.
Treefarmer

Quality, very few made, age, and condition. Terry

Agree - scarcity

For me the term rare as applied to knife collecting implies desirable/value. The alternative would be obscure, scarce with little market appeal.

I like Scarcity....

Tom

In my humble opinion I feel that age is probably the most defining factor in determining the,"rarity" or "scarcity" of a knife.I say that because otherwise a custom knife made last week could qualify as being rare.
A knife made by one of the giants of knife manufacturing probably would not qualify due to the fact that literally thousands were made every day. A particular pattern(such as one with more than four blades)might qualify though.
Handle material I don't think is a factor unless it is made of gold and encrusted with precious stones.
Size could be a factor such as a multi-bladed miniature knife or a huge display piece.
Defining how many were originally made bight be difficult on early knives as I don't think records were kept as to how many of a specific pattern were produced unless we are talking about military contract knives.
And finally the condition of a knife;while important in determining relative worth is not a huge factor in determining rarity although that point could be argued to death. I have a knife that had some very well sharpened(read that over-sharpened)blades and one of them I thought had been broken and re-sharpened. When I examined it more closely I found that the blade was apparently made that way(judging from the tiniest nail mark I have ever seen)and was likely used to trim off the end of a cigar. My judgement was justified when I acquired another knife of the same period(1840-1850)that had an almost identical blade in it.
In conclusion my vote for rarity in a knife would have to be a multi-bladed knife with unusual implements in the knife.Your mileage may vary.

I'd say the criteria is different between modern knives and vintage knives.

For modern knives, number produced would be the main reason to label a particular knife as rare. But I think you could also include "hard to find" as a feature/subcategory under rare as well. What I mean by "hard to find" is how often does a particular knife come up for resale on the secondary market.

As a generic example, a modern knife company could have made a good quantity of a particular knife and then discontinued it. If that knife is almost never offered on the secondary market (e.g. knife shows, eBay), then it is hard to find or in other words "rare" to see it for resale even though it was produced in a sizable quantity.

For vintage knives, I agree with Scott. Scarcity seems the best way to put it. There's no one factor or combination of the above in the original post that covers all vintage knives. Sometimes a knife is rare because it's an unusual pattern; other times a knife is rare due to the number of blades; sometimes another knife is rare due to the tang stamp. To me, the less often you see a particular knife the rarer it is.

Manufacturer I think is first, and foremost.
If Joseph Rodgers / Sheffield had produced a dozen of a particular pattern in 1890, and all of them were accounted for I imagine they could have a nice value. If ONE became available it would be sought after.
If Case today were to make ONE knife in say jade handles... they could name a price, and someone would pay it.

If Parker knives had a dozen of one pattern (which they do but by the hundreds of unique patterns) no one really notices them or puts a premium on these "rare/scarce knives.

So I have to say manufacturer is what I am finding is the most important factor in collecting, and this is from a new collector.
Following that the question of "rare" is the number of a particular pattern made, and the amount of them that are remaining.

Age does not really seem to be a factor.

Here is an example of a "rare" knife. It is a Case Tested XX letter opener knife with a coffin shaped handle and spey blade. I have never found a listing for it in any Case reference material and Cindy Taylor had never seen one either.I consider this a "rare" knife.
Is it a valuable knife? Probably not as there is little interest in collecting letter opener knives.Did they make a lot of them? Again highly doubtful. Is it in great shape? Yes it is.
I like it because it is unusual and that is what I have looked for the last several years.They don't have to be valuable or in perfect condition(although that is always a plus)but have to shall we say,"trip my trigger".