Herbst, Gawie

Gawie started to make knives as a hobby in 1985. His passion and love for this hobby inspired him to pursue this as a career in 1998. Gawie is an extremely talented knife-maker. He is constantly looking for more creative ways to improve his skill as a knife maker. He is the first knife-maker to master decorative laser-cutting through blades. Gawie is particularly known for his spectacular African designs, especially the designs of the Big Five. Since he started his career as a knife-maker he won frequent awards for his marvellous knives and became a member of the Knife-makers Guild of Southern Africa in 2001. He won the prize for the Best Newcomer on the Guild Show that year. Gawie and his son, Thinus, started the Herbst Knife-making Academy with great success. To date, hundreds of students attended knife-making courses presented by the Academy. Gawie is also well known for being a trendsetter in the knife-making industry. As there is a very limited variety of knife-making equipment available in South Africa, he decided to design and manufacture his own unique range of highly specialized knife-making machines. These machines became very popular among the true hobbyist and professional knife-maker. Today he is one of the leading manufacturers of knife-making machines in the world.