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Post by plainsman on Mar 15, 2016 15:11:28 GMT
I've googled this a bit and still don't quite understand it.
Paul Chen owns Hanwei? Paul Chen's sword manufacturing facility is called Hanwei? Every sword sold by Hanwei is made by Hanwei, and thus is a Paul Chen sword? Paul Chen designs all the swords made by Hanwei? There is no distinction between Paul Chen and Hanwei, they are one and the same?
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Post by plainsman on Mar 15, 2016 15:14:33 GMT
Also...
All Hanwei swords are forged in house at their own private forge? Hanwei does not forge swords for other people or other companies?
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Post by Aurélien on Mar 15, 2016 16:36:43 GMT
Paul Chen is the founder/owner of Hanwei. Despite P. Chen's Taiwanese origins, both forges and HQ are based in Dalian (Continental China). He is not the only one to design the swords Hanwei sells : Bugei, among others, collaborates with him to design and forge some weapons (the Raptor line, for example.) Paul Chen's son, Ron Chen, is also a famous swordsmith. Specialized in katana forging, he's been trained by a famous Japanese smith. He lives in Taiwan and mainly forges for his own workshop. Another Chen is famous among sword collectors : this one works for Dynasty Forge, but has no family link to the Chens from Hanwei Company. Hope it helps!
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Post by Aurélien on Mar 15, 2016 16:51:33 GMT
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Post by nddave on Mar 15, 2016 17:03:25 GMT
Pretty much, the confusion usually comes from seller sites advertising as either Hanwei, Paul Chen or Paul Chen/Hanwei. They're all technically Hanwei Swords. Since there's obviously so many Pauls and specifically Paul Chens in the sword industry the other one I know of is Paul Chen of Cheness Swords.
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Post by Aurélien on Mar 15, 2016 17:37:22 GMT
Chen of Cheness = Chen of Dynasty Forge. Fred Chen, founder of Huano Forge. A talentuous smith.
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Post by Ronin Katana on Mar 15, 2016 19:14:09 GMT
I've googled this a bit and still don't quite understand it. Paul Chen owns Hanwei? Paul Chen's sword manufacturing facility is called Hanwei? Every sword sold by Hanwei is made by Hanwei, and thus is a Paul Chen sword? Paul Chen designs all the swords made by Hanwei? There is no distinction between Paul Chen and Hanwei, they are one and the same? To my knowledge, neither Paul nor his son are working at or have ownership in Hanwei any longer. It was sold to an investment group a few years ago. Paul (SBG Paul) and I were going to go visit them this year, but the trip got pushed back to 2017.
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Post by randomnobody on Mar 15, 2016 19:20:35 GMT
Chen of Cheness = Chen of Dynasty Forge. Fred Chen, founder of Huano Forge. A talentuous smith. I don't know about this. Cheness is (was?) another Paul Chen; Dynasty Forge (and/or Huanuo?) is Fred Chen.
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Post by Adrian Jordan on Mar 15, 2016 19:30:27 GMT
Paul Chen of Cheness = Cheness only, hahaha.
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Post by nddave on Mar 15, 2016 21:49:49 GMT
That's what I thought because I remember him clarifying he was a different Paul Chen than the one associated with Hanwei but didn't mention any other brands he was affiliated with.
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Post by nddave on Mar 15, 2016 21:52:52 GMT
I've googled this a bit and still don't quite understand it. Paul Chen owns Hanwei? Paul Chen's sword manufacturing facility is called Hanwei? Every sword sold by Hanwei is made by Hanwei, and thus is a Paul Chen sword? Paul Chen designs all the swords made by Hanwei? There is no distinction between Paul Chen and Hanwei, they are one and the same? To my knowledge, neither Paul nor his son are working at or have ownership in Hanwei any longer. It was sold to an investment group a few years ago. Paul (SBG Paul) and I were going to go visit them this year, but the trip got pushed back to 2017. That's news for sure, surprised this hadn't been talked about before because that's kind of a big thing for the industry when one of the industry leaders steps down and isn't running his company anymore. So what is Paul doing now? is he still making swords or has he retired from the industry? His son is still making his own swords isn't he?
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Post by randomnobody on Mar 15, 2016 22:04:24 GMT
Part of me also wonders if that happened (first I've heard if it, too, but then I've never looked into it) before or after the fire. Wouldn't be surprised if the massive financial loss from the fire lead to seeking investors and eventually selling the company, or just leading Mr. Chen to decide "Yeah, I'm done with this; somebody else can take it from here." I don't recall reading anywhere how old of a fellow he is, either...
As for his son (Ron, was it?) I haven't heard anything about him in ages, come to think of it...
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Post by plainsman on Mar 15, 2016 22:08:02 GMT
I've googled this a bit and still don't quite understand it. Paul Chen owns Hanwei? Paul Chen's sword manufacturing facility is called Hanwei? Every sword sold by Hanwei is made by Hanwei, and thus is a Paul Chen sword? Paul Chen designs all the swords made by Hanwei? There is no distinction between Paul Chen and Hanwei, they are one and the same? To my knowledge, neither Paul nor his son are working at or have ownership in Hanwei any longer. It was sold to an investment group a few years ago. Paul (SBG Paul) and I were going to go visit them this year, but the trip got pushed back to 2017. Wow, yeah. That is big news for sure!
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Post by nddave on Mar 15, 2016 22:40:40 GMT
Part of me also wonders if that happened (first I've heard if it, too, but then I've never looked into it) before or after the fire. Wouldn't be surprised if the massive financial loss from the fire lead to seeking investors and eventually selling the company, or just leading Mr. Chen to decide "Yeah, I'm done with this; somebody else can take it from here." I don't recall reading anywhere how old of a fellow he is, either... As for his son (Ron, was it?) I haven't heard anything about him in ages, come to think of it... That crossed my mind as well. I don't think he's that old, or at least didn't look it in pics included in the SBG/SMG interview a few years back ( could have been older photos not from the interview's date). Wasn't the son just mentioned and discussed in a topic thread about custom tamagahane from China a few months ago? Maybe it was a necro'd thread but I'm sure a few members were talking about his work. What's surprising is we have a CAS/Hanwei employee that post frequently here in the M/V Board and others and never saw a mention of the change of hands and or retirement of Paul Chen. As far as I knew too, he was still running the factory. Wonder if that's why we've been seeing so many new styled katana and a few reissues of some of the discontinued models like the Praying Mantis and Iga/Koga Ninjato. Still would like to see the prices shaved down a little more. Doesn't need to be the old 2005 prices but would like to see a couple hundred dollars shaved off the retails. Paying Bugei prices for more mid teir Hanwei katana is pushing it a little. Perhaps once the new owners get things in order we'll go back to seeing not only more products but more competitive pricing too. Hanwei should realize by now that the whole fleabay katana market is killing them and they could easily regain the top spot and in turn kill off much of the junky fleabay market if the regained their competitive price points.
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Post by Croccifixio on Mar 16, 2016 2:49:33 GMT
The son of Paul Chen (Ron) was an apprentice of Yoshindo Yoshihara of Western fame (he was one of the most talented Japanese swordsmiths who reached out to the Western world through seminars, books, and videos). I can only imagine Ron is a full-time licensed Japan-accredited swordsmith nowadays.
I also read in one post here that Paul Chen (Hanwei) left the company a few years ago (2013 I think?).
Addendum:
If Hanwei had taken steps to fix their tsuka and maybe add a hishigami option for their lower-priced blades, they'd probably have killed off the ebay sellers.
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Post by Aurélien on Mar 16, 2016 4:39:52 GMT
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Post by drjoe on Apr 2, 2016 14:48:16 GMT
in the world of japanese swordsmithing, "studying with" and "apprenticing" are two completely different things in terms of time and the nature of the relationship. which is to say that ron chen may have studied with, but did not apprentice under, yoshindo yoshihara. i think it's safe to say that he is neither licensed (in Japan), nor "Japan-accredited," whatever that means. none of this takes away from Ron's skill as a smith, but the distinction is important.
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Post by knowntocustomize on May 1, 2016 7:08:01 GMT
So, the reason why the older Martin dreadnaught guitars are worth six figures or more is because they were made from wood that the factory had before a big fire, obviously because it would be impossible to acquire that wood to make more. Does anybody think that this will make the classic practicals or even more recent swords see a jump in value in the future? I'd be really interested to hear what the opinion of the general public as well as people that know more of the specifics of the fire, what was lost, or any other factors that may effect something like that.
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Post by randomnobody on May 1, 2016 7:45:39 GMT
Almost nothing can or will ever add value to a low-end production sword. In the case of your guitar analogy, different woods have different acoustics and this is important for musical instruments, but it doesn't really matter which stock of materials a Chinese sword company makes their stuff out of.
They're also improving in minute ways every year, such that a sword from five years ago is pretty poorly thought of today.
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