Toledo is a City full of knives, both physically and historically. So during Gayle and my recent…read moretrip to Spain, this is one souvenir that I really wanted. And if you show up here with a Rick Steves' Spain Tour Guide, there's a 10% discount in it for you.
The Toledo streets wind around a lot and if you keep walking, you'll eventually find Mariano behind the counter of his long and narrow shop (with his workshop behind). It's right "behind" the Ayuntamiento/City Hall in a fairly nondescript store front.
Judging by what's left of Mariano's hands and a few knicks I picked up along the way, his knives are very sharp. He was also very honest about materials, quality, and use of the various grades that he sells. A few of the knives defied my immediate sense of logic on how they worked, and Mariano was very patient and helpful in explaining the mechanisms. I gave up on one of them and figured that if I couldn't safety work the thing, I wasn't going to buy it. Gayle ended up purchasing that one for one of her sons who does have that skill. I was happy with a more decorative pocket knife choice with a nice 2-tone bone inlay.
