Black Snow Customs (Nati Amor)

Black Snow Customs — is an Israeli brand of custom knives under the name of Nati Amor. Wide blades, an exquisite finishing, impeccable mechanics and slick movement are distinctive features of his works. The very first knife of Nati Sabotage, became a hit among fans of custom knives.

Nati Amor's path

Nati Amor's way to the world of professional knife-making was a long one. First, he mastered another profession, which played an important role in his career as a knife maker.

Nati learned to be a jeweler and for over seventeen years he successfully created various men's jewelry, including bracelets, rings and cufflinks. Amor worked with gold, sterling silver, diamonds and other gemstones.

However, all this time he was haunted by youthful love for folding knives. The master was a frequent visitor on custom art forums, he discussed with knife fans new folders and flippers. The first step in this world was the creation of lanyard beads. Knife fans gladly decorated their lanyards with his silver skulls, copper helmets and bronze “primitive Venus”.

“I knew I was a good jeweler, but I had a prejudice, I had a doubt that I could make good knives. I understood that I had to overcome my fear, my insecurity and do something my own, something real, high-quality”, confessed Nati Amor in an exclusive interview with the portal "Knives of Maria Stalina".

Amor met a countryman Lee Lerman on one of the knifemaker’s forums. Lerman completed a maquette of his own first folding knife at age 15, and at 22 he left the profession of a carpenter to fully devote himself to custom knife-making. Nati and Lee became friends. The jeweler sent sketches of future knives to his younger comrade, and consulted on the mechanism and materials. Lerman persuaded Nati Amor to move from theory to practice, he provided his own knife workshop to a friend and gave some lessons on making flippers. Amor's first folders were shaped like typical tanto.

For six years, Nati Amor made flippers solely for his own pleasure, on average, one knife a year. The situation fundamentally changed in 2016 when the master presented his first professional model.

Sabotage blew up the world of custom knifemaking and took deserving place in the “expensive gift knives” section. This heavy flipper with a wide blade of 4.25 inches was nicknamed the "pocket machete". Despite the resemblance between Sabotage and the traditional instrument of Latin Americans, Nati Amor assures he wasn’t inspired by other knives, but simply wanted to fulfill an old dream to make a large and functional knife. 

The master confirmed the practicality of his creation with a series of videos in which he hit the open Sabotage on the table and chopped a palm branch.

Since some foreign fans of Sabotage could not get a full-sized version of the flipper for legal reasons, Nati Amor created Mini Sabotage with 3.5-inch blade. The master took revenge on the small dimensions of a mini-model by creating his third creation — the real heavyweight Opiate. Opiate remanded the "extended" version of the original Sabotage.

Each custom flipper of Nati Amor is unique. The master is constantly experimenting with different materials: Mokuti, Mokume, Zirconium, G10, Damascus. Amor doesn't get tired of looking for new combinations for handle inlays.

“I love exotic materials, I am constantly on the search. I don’t want to stop, it’s important for me to always develop”, said Nati Amor in an interview for online-store “Maria Stalina Knives”.

The only thing the master doesn’t experiment with yet is knife mechanism. A titanium Liner Lock and pivot bearings are unchanging components of all his customs.

"Knife mechanics it is a special world, there is a design, but there are locks. I hope that I will conquer it someday”, — admitted the knifemaker who glorified the knives of Israel.