Thirty years ago, when Komin Yamada conceived of the Global kitchen knife, he wasn’t sure it would be successful. The knife was to be stainless steel from tip to handle, something out of place in today’s kitchen knife market and vastly more so in Japan decades ago.
The idea was to make a knife made of a single, durable material would last longer and have less weak points than a blade fitted to a handle. The result was just that. Three years after its initial release, the Global knife won a Good Design Award in 1990 and was later given a Good Design Long Life Award for its staying power.
The Global kitchen knives are made of Yoshikin’s (its parent company) proprietary Cromova 18 steel, a semi-mysterious mixture of chromium, molybdenum and vanadium, and is semi-analogous to VG-10 stainless steel, a popular steel for both Japanese and western-style kitchen knives. The key difference being, due to higher (though undefined exact percentage) chromium levels, it’s significantly hardier than VG-10, and most stainless knife steel in general. This means it’s unlikely to chip, is supremely corrosion resistant and doesn’t stain under any circumstances. Naturally, you do lose just slightly in the edge-holding department, and it’s not as easy to sharpen as softer steels (this is the balance of hardness and toughness versus cutting utility).
On all Global knives, as noted above, the handle is an extension of the blade. This is incredibly useful for an everyday kitchen knife, as there are no nooks or crannies for food particles or moisture to hide in and ruin the knife. The lack of bulky handle also allows the knife to be incredibly lightweight, but still well-balanced (to achieve this, the handle is hollow and filled with sand).
Among a collection of other Global knives, the G-2 Chef’s Knife (its most popular blade) is more than 50 percent on Massdrop right now. That’s well under its lowest reported price on Amazon. The drop will be active for the next three days.