Originally Posted by Fire

Hi all- I love threads like these, mostly because I run a (small) sword company- we do our own work, and also sell a lot of the major brands-of the more affordable factory brands, Paul chen's hanwei forge puts out fairly good rapiers, and most are available with matching daggers, also, Hanwei sells replacement blades so if you beat one to shit on stage or in practice you can get a new one, whereas museum replicas does not offer this luxury- I sell both brands, but for that reason alone recommend hanwei to the majority of my customers MRL doea a good job, but is also slightly more expensive on average and if you are going to do any choreographed work or practice, it will beat em up QUICK....- for small shop high end blades, I have heard good things about Alchem swords, and also arms and armor- few custom guys make rapiers- its kind of specialized , and tempering a long, thin, slender blade can be a cast iron bitch-