Trevor began knife making as apprentice to his uncle, in 1957 when he was fifteen years old and at that time his uncle had ten workers. He worked there for ten years before moving to another folding knife manufacturers doing more specialised work; gimping and glazing open razors. When his uncle died in 1975, he took over the business with his brother and continued making working folding knives with two or three men that had worked with his uncle. In 1980, he started working on his own, in the manner that he still does today.
Folding knife making in Sheffield has now largely become a semi-industrialised process constructing knives from pre-stamped parts. As stamping the parts is an inaccurate process and making the internal mechanism run smoothly requires accuracy, some considerable customisation is still needed to make the knives. This aspect is of particular interest to the new generation of knife makers who are focused on producing very individual custom knives where the integration of mechanism and form is fundamental to the success of their design and subtly different for each product.
The trend in this field is for craftsmen, especially in the USA, to produce individual beautifully made knives that command high prices. By contrast the industrial tradition in Sheffield has focused on relatively cheap standard products that, arguably, do not justify the level of craftsmanship employed. One of the main aims of this research has been to assist with the transmission of skills to a new generation interested in more innovative or artistic work.
