While the blades used by modern Sushi chefs may not fit the context of historical knives, I think my question does.

This all started while watching Iron Chef. One of the challengers whipped out a brand new (quote "priceless") custom knife made just for that contest. The knife had an older looking line to it that caught my eye.

So this last weekend I run into Jim Hrisoulas at an event we were both attending (along with Tony Lemon and a couple of other former students of Jim's). In talking about traditional Japanese utility type blades, he reminded me of a period construction technique. That being a single layer of steel welded side-by-side with an iron layer. Then the edge bevel is ground on only one side, exposing the steel layer about 1/2 way down the bevel. Thus, leaving both the steel and iron layer intact along the back of the blade (a hard edge and tough back being the desired result).

But what I fail to remember is which side the bevel goes on. I think it is beveled on the right side of the blade and flat on the left for right handed use. Does that sound correct?

I have a chisel ground "la Griffe" by Fred Perrin and that's how it's ground for this right hander. Fred, went out of his way to make sure that I had one ground the proper way for my hand.

beveled on the right side of the blade and flat on the left for right handed use is correct.
if you are a lefty, bladegallery.com usually stocks left hand knives.

I was watching something a while back that was describing these blades. I vaguely remember something about an overall chisel-like grind, but with a double bevel where there was a shallow angle which started about halfway down and then either a more steep flat grind, or a hollow grind for the bottom 1/2' or so. Is this a totally modern adaptation of a single maker, or a standard for that style blade? This was a large "sushi" chef's knife.

Breathing some air into this old thread.

Well, I finaly got around to finishing this knife (photos in a couple of days)

A couple of commnets.

You can't get Ho wood in the USA, or so it seems. But almost everyone agrees that poplar makes a good subsitute, so that is what I used for the handle.

I clad 1084 with pure iron. I may just use mild steel in the future. Because this thing warped like mad during heat treating. I trying to fix it, I put a crack in the tang, so now my 6" sushi knife is a 4" sushi knife. But it was worth the trouble. The line between the iron and steel is very sweet.