Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/929822
In 1979, Les de Asis with little help of his buddy Victor Anselmo, manufactured the first butterfly-style knife in his garage to replace the cheap balisongs he played with when he was a kid. In 1980 the Bali-Song was formed where the custom variants of butterfly knives were made, plus the first serial knife, the no. 68. In next seven years, the offer was expanded with standard folding and fixed knives under the name of Pacific Cuttlery. After going bankrupt, Asis re-started his business in 1988 under a Benchmade brand, with re-edition of no. 68. The company was dynamically evolving – the new technologies were implemented and Mel Pardue and Warren Osborne designers were hired. The quality and availability of different knives made "A Butterfly" a strong competitor to ever popular "Spider". Few years back, there were some significant changes in the company, some steel-loving society members would even call it controversial. From several categories of the blades, dedicated for the different customers (from whole line up consisting of premium Gold, standard Black and Blue, and budget Red lines, only the latter was disbanded. Together with rising of prices, small number of new designs (and disbanding the most interesting products), my interest in Benchmade offer became insignificant. I wasn't expecting anything from the 2017 Benchmade Catalog. The first positive sign was for sure a new "Butterfly", making me understand that company doesn't want to burn the bridges. But for test purposes I have decided to choose something more practical, and instead an alternative for Model #42, I wanted to find a successor of the king of the kings of everyday use knives, the legendary Griptilian. Finally I took two similarly styled folding knives – the 590 Boost and 560 Freek. www.fragoutmag.com