ISSA-Certified · Norman Black

Keep your Edge.

Knives, scissors, garden tools and mower blades — sharpened by hand by Norman Black. Five dollars a blade, decades of practice in every pass.

Services Contact

"A poor workman blames his tools, as the saying goes — but sometimes it really is the tool's fault."

— A local feature on Norman Black

— The Craft

Every edge,
restored.

Most blades are shaped and finished in minutes on a precision belt grinder. Larger items — mower blades, chainsaws — head home with Norman and come back balanced and ready.

— 01

Knives

Chef's, paring, hunting, pocket. Shaped on a belt grinder, finished on a fine abrasive — kept square to the original geometry.

— 02

Scissors & Shears

Household, sewing, professional hair shears, hair clipper blades. Pivot tension and convex edges respected to ISSA standard.

Garden tools, hedge trimmers and shovels

— 03

Garden & Yard

Hedge trimmers, pruners, axes, hatchets, shovels. Around here you need a shovel that can cut through rock — Norman makes sure it does.

— 04

Mower & Chainsaw

Larger jobs head home for sharpening on bigger equipment. Drop off at the market, pick up next visit — balanced and ready.

$5 per blade · most jobs

Larger items quoted up front · cash · no surprises

Norman Black at the Freight Station Farmers Market

— At the Market Boscawen St · Winchester, VA

— The Sharpener

A whetstone at ten.
A belt grinder at sixty.
Giving back.

Norman Black has been sharpening blades since he was ten — first with a Boy Scout's whetstone in Baltimore, where he became the troop's go-to for any dull edge.

He's a retired engineer now, based in Bunker Hill, West Virginia, and three years into a precision belt grinder that turns most jobs into a few minutes of careful work.

A portion of every job goes back into the community through the Kiwanis Club of Winchester.

ISSA Certified

Member of the International Scissor Sharpening Association — formal training in shear geometry and convex edges.

Carries Spares

A bag of knives travels with him — given away or sold for the same price as sharpening, so no one's working with junk.

— How It Works