Alessio lives with his wife, Reanna Leach, and their 8-month-old daughter in Grande Prairie, Alberta. He is a Swiss Journeyman Artistic Blacksmith and Knifemaker.
Alessio grew up in Switzerland, but in 1996, when he was 11, he travelled with his family to Salmon Arm, BC, to visit his uncle. His uncle, a self-taught blacksmith, gave Alessio his first taste of Blacksmithing. During his visit, Alessio made a nail, and he says, “That was the nail in the coffin … I was hooked. It was the combination of all the elements: fire, water, air, earth (carbon) - and the visuals, sounds, and smells that got ingrained into me. I knew that’s what I wanted to do.”
When he went back to Switzerland, his mother visited multiple Blacksmith shops looking for one that would take him on. She finally found one, and at 13, he started learning the trade (forging, soldering, welding, fabricating). By the time he was 15, he was making products that the company sold. At 16, he officially started his four-year metalworking apprenticeship. In Switzerland, this apprenticeship is broad and in-depth, learning how to work with different metals and peripheral materials. Some of the skills he learned included welding, working with machinist tools such as mills and lathes; basically combining apprenticeships in fabrication, pipe fitting, welding, iron working, and tap and dye making. After four years, he completed his exams, but he still needed to do another 2 years to earn the Journeyman title.
In Switzerland, apprentices need to leave their hometowns and “journey” to another town to apply their knowledge and work under different “Masters” for room and board. After two years, they can return to their homes and start working under their earned designation as a Journeyman. Alessio journeyed to Canada and worked with his uncle for part of the two years until his visa ran out. He completed his journey in Switzerland. Then he returned to Canada and worked with his uncle until 2013.
Around this time, Alessio met longtime Knifemaker, Roger Hatt, who took him under his wing. For the next year, he plunged into knifemaking and got to know the community through the Western Canada Knife Association. Shortly thereafter, he moved to Grande Prairie, taking a position as a welder, but the recession hit, and the company downsized. Alessio took this opportunity to start “AZ Custom Knives Ltd”, a corporation that has grown and evolved over the past 10 years. Reanna also jumped on board as a company owner, and together they moved out of their garage into a commercial location that provided space for a shop, office, and a storefront.
AZ Custom Knives is diverse, offering Alessio’s custom products, including knives, sheaths, and sculptures, as well as classes in knife making, forging, sharpening, and sheath making. They have even branched into Corporate Team Building! Alessio also provides sharpening, restoration, and regrind services - he strives for perfection in everything he does. He and Reanna sell only high-quality retail products, including knives, cutting boards, sharpening supplies, and more. Alessio has as much passion for teaching as he has for blacksmithing. He says, “I teach with passion, transparency, and authenticity. I like to create a place where people can come, feel safe, and create something with their hands. It is not unusual for a student to tell me that “It was one of the best days of their lives”.
Alessio primarily makes kitchen and hunting knives (mostly using stock removal). He enjoys working with clients to make new designs. He recently used his 3D printer to work with a client on a new custom design. After 17 versions, he finally achieved an optimal design for the client. Alessio continued to test it with other customers, and he has now incorporated this new “Defender" knife into his collection.
His favourite steels are MagnaCut, CruWear, VG10 and ZDP-189 for his custom projects, and 80CRV2 and 1084 for his students. For handle material, he likes to make functional knives with G10 handles because of its stability and resiliency, and he can offer a lifetime warranty. If requested by a customer, he will use stabilized wood and other materials, but his Lifetime Warranty will likely be reduced to a 15 year warranty on the handle. All AZ Custom Knives come with a Lifetime Warranty and Free Lifetime Sharpening.
Words of wisdom – “Knife making has no starting point and no ending point. Learning never stops." My motto is “Perfection can only be reached if you aim for it.” I also like to refer to Roger Hatt’s mantra, “Knife making is whatever works.””
Alessio’s Blacksmith Tips:
1. Strengthen your forearm grip: grip strength and a full range-of-motion with high-strength muscles are very helpful when forging.
2. Strength comes out of your whole body: if you try to focus on using one muscle, or the limited muscle groups you strengthened from Tip 1, you are going to hurt. Our body is a spring from head to toe. Use it. Be dynamic. If you are static, you will break.
3. THUMB DOWN! Don't grip your hammer with your thumb in the "thumb's up" position for heavy forging (this is the sentence I tell the most often to my students - probably up to 20x in a session).
4. Don't waste energy. If you hammer on cold material, you waste your own energy + fuel for the forge. So, utilize the forge's energy and then utilize your own.
5. Remember, first comes accuracy, then comes power, then comes speed.
See AZ Custom Knives Ltd. website: https://www.azcustomknives.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AZCustomKnives/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/az_custom_knives
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