formal 'razor school' of Germany

[Squancher79]

Some fascinating stuff learned this week about formal training of razor maintenance/production, which I do not believe some here think really exists at all.

In Germany, there is an official physical school for all facets of razor production including sharpening/honing/grinding/heat treatment, etc., in fact there is similar school for a barber, baker, and other hand trades. These are called "Meisterschule" and it is something that is a physical school, generally there are several rooms in a larger building and the various trades one does with their hands each have their own subsection. A Meister has exhibited complete mastery of all facets of their chosen trade and has studied the theoretical elements of their trade for 2yrs, a master grinder can produce and train in scissors, razors, cutlery, etc. and will have extremely deep knowledge of the variations necessary in metallurgy and treatment. It is a big deal, over there.

Inspired by the dialogue here, I asked a native German coworker to ask oen there, this is about Germany's Meister concept;

'We have a rather special and good occupational training concept in Germany.

To become a Meister you must attend a special (physical) school for 2 years. To be admitted to Meisterschule you present a certificate of apprenticeship, proof you have successfully passed examination at end of your apprenticeship and have sufficient background knowledge and trade skill to become a Meister. Apprenticeship takes 3 years of your valuable life in a company.

In total it will take roughly 5 years, 3 years apprenticeship + 2 years Meisterschule, until you stand in front of a jury to proof becoming a Meister. There is always a test in which you must make a 'masterpiece' and the incumbent Meisters will take this and examine it, and it is considered an honor in Germany to be a Meister on the jury of your profession. A Meister encompasses mastery of every single facet of production, maintenance, theory, for a field of occupation.

A certificate issued to a Meister is a Meisterbrief and is signed by the district president in cooperation with the Chamber of Commerce and Trade. This is a very official certificate and it ensures professional education is up to standards.

A good Meister offers a wide range of skills to a company. The Meister is authorised to take responsibility of the company's apprentices/trainees. A Meisterbrief generally includes a kind of instructor's licence for this purpose. For a smaller business, it is necessary to have a Meister on the payroll to be allowed to open the business at all, and also it sounds nice (in German) when a company can say Meisterbetrieb, as the word Meister is really a confidence building.

Due data protection rules I will not send a Meisterbrief but they're searchable on the internet presumably by those voluntarily allowing their own data shared.'

Here are two searching image results 'meisterbrief' (blacked out names but see many more online)

Read more (German only) at de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meisterbrief

Like most forum, this is an arena for and by the self-taught. We should all always be learning. But we should also be respectful in the assurance of our self-taught declarations here, that there also really is a formal training available, a training involving bricks and buildings and school and professors and a requirement of actual full time work for 3yrs just to get to the theory parts and a presentation of one's mastery to those that have mastered the field of trade before them. Imagine how you might would feel, if you were a Meister, and someone who did not have to do anything you had to do and only had to passionately join a hobby told you with great assurance no less that you and yours were doing it all wrong.

!

 

[stone and strop]

With all due respect,

This seems more like a Cutlers trade and not specifically for straight razors which was described in the other thread as specifically for honing straight razors.
Many if not most razor makers of old were Cutlers as well, but given the times, straight razors were more a part of their business.
I have a straight razor by Eikaso, a cutler from way back. They are still in business today as knifemakers/ professional Cutlers.

I seriously doubt they are teaching and practicing (not just the theory) of grinding out full hollow razors and honing them by hand to the pinnacle of fineness.
I'm sure it would be discussed at least in some detail.

They have these trades in the states too, it called Journeyman Smith and subsequently Master Smith.
A full trade system in place just like you describe and judged by their peers starting with mandatory in school training etc.
It is a noble trade like any other and very well respected.
It is the American "Cutlers" equivalent if there could be such a thing.

What would be interesting to me is to see proportionately where time was being spent in training and to what extent it was being taught.
My own trade being based on 5 different areas where the apprenticeship had to cover X amount of hours per area where some areas were much less involved than others.

A cutlery school is not a razor honing school. It may cover it some due to the history but again, I seriously doubt they are training modern smiths/cutlers to hollow grind straight razors and hone them by hand to the standard that we shave with.

As anyone with tell you, having your razor honed by a knifemaker, a professional one at that, or a blade smith complete with certification is not going to give the same results as someone who has truly learned from many, many years of experimentation and evaluation at one single aspect - honing.

 

[stone and strop]

Germany is not the only country that's puts rigorous training for the Cutlery trade at the highest level.
These trades are primarily geared to knifemaking and touch on other cutting implements.
Japan coming to mind, Sweden and a few others.
The emphasis is all encompassing in manipulation of steel (annealing, normalizing, heating,forging and the huge amount of different heat treat that could be applied for different applications), handles and finally sharpening.

Ultimately they are schools of the Cutlery profession, not specific to razors. Much more so to knives and knife making.

 

[Squancher79]

Sir stonestrop, my contact's a Nordrhein-Westfalen native There is most definitely a 'razor school', and a 'scissor school', and a 'knife school', in the meister 'grinding school' (the physical one, that you said did not exist).

Just a few rooms each for some 'schools' but that is still a 'razor school' to them, by all means. It is a faculty that only teaches how to make razors for two years for the time that they give that student. Each party's certification's verbiage specifically reflects this; furthermore when mastering to produce ___ (you must make such declaration of your intent, just like a major here but a mandatory vs undeclared), you must produce ___ as your 'master piece' final grade, which is to be studied by the incumbent meisters in a sort of query presentation like arguments before SCOTUS.

This arrangement is all similar to a major and minor in USA, but in reverse; the metallurgical basics are all taught to everyone in the Meisterschulen but then declared study of chosen ___ specialty, razors knives scissors whatever you intend to primarily produce, is your major time %.

Incumbent meisters declare you produce a ___, of their specification, to which the critique/eval occurs after you produce your ___. It could be an extra hollow ground 8/8" razor from ___ steel with a smile grind and ___ rockwell and they evaluate sharpness edge flexibility etc. In this case, they call the profession 'razor-grinder' (this is where you can specify "but they didn't specifically say honing!", for sure I bet it came up though LOL). An item you make in whatever field, of extreme specification, is always a final test.

In fact all firms producing wiht the solingen name embedded to the steel, they must have 1+ 'master razor grinder' on payroll, same for scissors, knives and general cutlery, and this is all spelled out in various ways in German on Solingen trademark law papers.

One's precise job title doesn't necessarily get written in their us college diplomas, either. But when one has a designated subjection of an industry, that subsection and their whole mastery thereto was by all means the pass/fail stuff for earning their diploma, too, in the US just as in Germany; you cannot make primarily razors for three years apprenticeship and come to the meister school to become meister in scissors without having to then make scissors that entirely impressed those very critical people, including the verbal 'proof' of concepts afterwards in the intervew sections...

 

[Squancher79]

don't think you understand how anal/regimented are the Germans, this same workfriend told me had an auto dealer in Köln and had a sign near the autoway to his shop advertising it (on a commercial road on his leased property)...he received a formal letter in the mail from the authorities on signage, including a large scale 1mm graph paper schematic that was +/-0.5mm accurate across the size of this entire sign and the spacing and definition of roadway/shoulder, something requiring many hours of survey/record/draft and perfect on an extremely large specialty sheet of paper, indicating that his ~2m sign put into ground with cement was <9cm too close to the roadway/shoulder.

You have to have a designated master of each tool in the tool town, yes it can be the same person but yes also it absolutely has to be designated, that is just how they are, similarly to this logic a master of woodworking coming from cabinetry cannot go run a cuckoo clock shop without having previously made cuckoo clocks for masters, but a 3yr apprentice of cuckoo clock making can most certainly go become a master in general woodworking (with the declared future intention thereafter to open his own company making and selling cuckoo clocks); he just can't go open a cabinet maker company after he masters.

 

[stone and strop]

Sir stonestrop, my contact's a Nordrhein-Westfalen native There is most definitely a 'razor school', and a 'scissor school', and a 'knife school', in the meister 'grinding school' (the physical one, that you said did not exist).

What I said.

There is no razor honing school to my knowledge.

Notice the word honing you conveniently left out.
You say there is a school for honing but admit it is for grinding, forging... whatever and also covers honing.
Honing, in and of itself, is not a trade nor is there a school specific to that.
That is what I said and that is what I meant.

It was purely to state that myself and every other member here and damn near everyone who hones razors is self taught.
It was directed to your indication that us "self taught" honers must not know anything because we had not been professionally trained at the razor honing school that does not exist.
I had no doubt about Cutlers and their trade, be it scissors, knives and even razors.
Are we all supposed to send our razors there because there is no way we could reach such levels of honing razors on our own?
I will have to disagree.

 

[Squancher79]

while there isn't a "p-value school" when one majors in statistics or actuarial sciences, actuaries certainly have to know everything there is to know about determining and drawing inferences from p-values if they wish to retain their occupation...or so I am told (by an actuary, this one formally trained in a school of actuarial sciences).

Nonetheless, I posit that actuaries do NOT know about p-values, because there is no such thing as a "p-value school", this obviously being the only place one could officially and properly learn of such.

Real learning comes frmo the street.

we have jumped over the sea predators enough here, mods please delete this pointhless thread.