Any recommendations for a real katana (traditionally made)

[u/More-Competition-603]

Looking for a traditionally made katana, i don't care so much about the type of steel as long as it's a quality katana but i would like a budget friendly katana, not a fake one that can be sold for like 30 quid. A proper katana, i wouldn't mind even a name of a company that sells good traditionally made katana's.

[u/pepimanoli]

An actual katana made in Japan in the traditional way is going to cost thousands of pounds. Think at least 2500 pounds.

Check out this website to see what kinds of things are being made and sold. It's a well know manufacturer, Nosyudo.

https://nosyudo.jp/item/itemgenre/shinken/

There are more options, but you may need to think about what do you need the sword for. If it's only for decoration, you may consider a iaito instead. They are swords with no edge made from a particular zinc alloy, so they cannot be sharpened either and are used for matial arts, like iaido. They look very pretty and are made to a much higher standard than the usual shopping mall katanas. Of course, you will not be able to cut anything with a iaito. You can find iaitos in the Nosyudo website too, or look somewhere else, like Minosaka, or Tozando (Tozando is more of a retailer, while Nosyudo and Minosaka are manufacturers).

If you want a sword to cut things in your backyard, I would also discourage the use of a real katana, if only because using a beautiful work of art to cut watermelons is something I consider wasteful, (but if you have the money, do whatever you want). You may want to look instead for a foreign made katana like, Hanwei or Huawei. They are not made from the traditional tamahagane steel, but they are much cheaper and they would be fine to cut stuff without cutting yor wallet in the process. Check out the Hanwei site if you want to see the prices.

https://hanwei-sword-shop.com/japanese/buying-katana/practical-katana/

In any case, you may get more useful information at the katana subreddit.

[u/More-Competition-603 → u/pepimanoli]

Thanks for the group and website. It would not be in my best interest to spend money on slicing objects with a katana. I would like it partially for display as well as practising with a katana if that answers you.

[u/pepimanoli → u/More-Competition-603]

In that case, I would recommend you to buy a iaito, they are made for practicing with swords and looking pretty. Since they are sports equipment and not weapons, you will have less problems at customs, but you should look into your countries laws in any case.

You have basically 2 options, buying from a retailer, or buying from a manufacturer.

Buying from a manufacturer is going to be cheaper and more likely to get you something of better quality, but you will have to wait, probably for a long time if you want a bespoke item. I bought a iaito from Nosyudo in September and it finally arrived to my country a few days ago. Now I have to wait for the boys in customs to review the documents I sent them, but it should arrive soon.

Regardless of where you buy, you can buy a ready made sword, or a custom one, whre you will get to choose colour and type of wrapping around the handle, the decorations on the handle, the pattern on the blade, etc. Of course, doind that is going to be more expensive. My sword cost me about 540€, including the shipping. Bear in mind that you will probably also have to pay taxes in you country too once the sword arrives.

Buying from a retailer like Tozando or Nine Circles is going to be more expensive, but items will arrive much quickly. It has also been said on this sub that Tozando brand iaitos are not as high quality as the ones you can buy from Minosaka or Nosyudo directly, but they are good enough regardless. They also sell swords from Minosaka and other manufacturers, and even their own brand is just a product made by assembling parts from others.

Both MInosaka and Nosyudo have people that speak english, so communicating with them by email is no issue.

All shops have a cahrt with heights of users and recommended lenghts. People on this sub usually like to have longer swords than recommended, but that's a mater of preference and it would be hard to know what you want without using swords for a while, so I'd go with the recommended lenghts.

There are usually 3 "weights" for iaito, lightweight, standard and heavy. Light is recommended for new people, but you can go with standard if you want. You can look for threads on this sub about choosing iaito, you may find useful information, but beware that people on this sub also love to give the ever so useful advice of "ask your sensei".