Seki City

Seki is a blade-making city in Gifu Prefecture, central Japan, where smiths have forged swords for seven hundred years. The tradition began with medieval swordsmiths drawn by the region's charcoal and river water, and it evolved into one of the world's great centers of kitchen cutlery.

Watch smiths at work at the swordsmith museum, then shop factory-direct at the Cutlery Hall, where cases run from paring knives to katana. North of town, the so-called Monet's Pond drifts koi over waterlilies beside a small shrine, a spring-fed pool that looks painted on calm days.

Come in October for the Cutlery Festival's street sales, or in summer for cormorant fishing on the Nagara River, staged here as well as in Gifu City. Trains on the Nagaragawa Railway reach Seki from Mino-Ota. Knife shoppers should save luggage space; the selection rewards the trip.