A Former Sushi Chef Sells and Sharpens Knives at Aframes Tokyo in Kalihi

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in HONOLULU Magazine in March 2023. You’ll still find Takeshi Aoki selling and sharpening all kinds of blades at his market stall in Kalihi.

Photo: Aaron K. Yoshino

My knife is embarrassing. I’ve brought an old one from my mother’s kitchen to Aframes Tokyo, Takeshi Aoki’s knife shop and sharpening service inside the open market at City Square. Amid produce and fish stalls, with the market’s fluorescent lights glinting off hundreds of razor-sharp knives in display cases, Aoki examines the flat sheen on my knife’s faded handle—and reaches for dish soap. “Knife, most people scared to clean,” he says, scrubbing at decades of residue with a rubber block. “You can cut yourself, yeah? But I’m not scared.”

Photo: Aaron K. Yoshino

Everyday knives, steak knives, cleavers. Pocket knives and hunting blades. Long sashimi swords. Soba knives, blocky with puzzle-piece-shaped indentations. All types crowd the displays at Aframes, as do whetstones and razor strops. Most of the wares are from Japan, including blades made with various grades of steel, some forged by craftsmen like Genkai Masakuni and Masashi Yamamoto. Many, like my mother’s, are Mac knives, factory-made and popular among home cooks in Hawai‘i. Aoki likes them because “every time I sharpen, nice edge comes back.” There are even knives for left-handed cooks and those with smaller hands.

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Photo: Aaron K. Yoshino

He eyes a barely noticeable smidge of rust where my knife’s blade meets the handle and sprinkles on Comet. “This place, butchers come in, hunters come in, divers come in,” he says. He’s sharpening my knife on a 200-grit grinding wheel, water dripping on the blade to keep it from overheating. “I sharpen a lot of haircutting scissors. After that, dog groomers started coming. All kine people come.”

FAST FACT: Aoki’s first memory of a knife is from age four: Too impatient to wait for a grown-up, he sliced his finger trying to peel an apple. He still has the scar.

This window on a cross-section of the chopping, slicing, scissoring world is why Aframes, which Aoki opened in 2006, has become the endpoint of a roundabout résumé that includes soba maker, cabinetmaker, sushi chef and seller of vintage Coleman lanterns. Customers stay and talk story, like the sushi wholesaler in line in front of me today. The story I get is about the $1,000 blade of a famous sushi chef—how Aoki, too scared to press it to his grinding machine, spent two days sharpening it by hand with 800-grit paper. My mother’s knife, now being finished on a whetstone, is one of 3,000 he’ll restore this year. So is my most treasured one, a gift from my family. I’m bringing it next time.

Open Sunday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., 1199 Dillingham Blvd., City Square Shopping Center (inside Chinatown Market Place), aframestokyo.com, @aframestokyo

Mari Taketa is editor of Frolic Hawai‘i and dining editor of HONOLULU Magazine.