Valyrian steel blades are scarce and costly, yet thousands of them remain in the world, perhaps some two hundred in the Seven Kingdoms alone (III: 359)
Needle For Sale
June 28th, 2009Get out your wallets, Needle is available for preordering now.
Click here to preorder Needle.
At this point we hope to have it out Fall of 2009, September or October, conservatively.
Included with the product information are some photographs for your viewing pleasure. Once we have the finalized box art we’ll post that as well.
If you cannot checkout let us know and we’ll work up a shipping quote for your country.
I’ve seen some comments people didn’t picture Needle like this, they pictured a rapier. I did too, GRRM set me straight, and it makes sense.
Needle was requisitioned for Arya as a lighter sword, not as a Braavosi sword. Jon had never been to Braavos, and Mikken, the man who made it, was a Northman, not a Braavosi. Arya’s teacher was eventually Braavosi of course, but that was long after she had left Winterfell. So, the issue is, what would Mikken, a Northman, have made when asked by Jon to make a light thin sword for Arya? The fighting style in which the sword is eventually used doesn’t change who made it and with what skill.
This is what makes ASOIAF so great, GRRM thinks of these things. A lesser fantasy novel might have Mikken conveniently be a smithing dynamo, familiar with all weapons the world over. But in these novels, characters realistically have limits to their abilities. It is best to think of Needle not as a Braavosi blade, it isn’t, but as an original Mikken creation.
Remember to stick them with the pointy end!
Final Needle Pictures
June 23rd, 2009Here is Needle, at last. We finally got the approvals from GRRM so we’re good to go to start mass production. Preordering should start very soon, within a week. Needle is a full tang high carbon steel blade, that comes with a plaque bearing the true Stark colors of grey on white. It’ll have a 24 inch blade and be about 30 inches overall.
Needle Updates
May 18th, 2009It has been awhile since we’ve had an update and so I thought I’d update you guys on things.
Needle’s prototype is done, and is at GRRM’s house right now. He is reviewing it, and as soon as he gives us the go ahead we can start manufacturing and getting the marketing photography done, and then you all can start placing preorders. I do not have shipping cost details yet, but the overall sword price will probably be $190. Again, Needle will be high carbon steel, purists rejoice. So hopefully you can place preorders by early or mid June.
The one issue we’re still niggling over is the length. Is our prototype the appropriate length for Arya Stark? Unfortunately we couldn’t get a hold of Arya for actual testing, she sent a raven saying she was busy in Braavos learning to become an assassin. Not wanting to make her “list” we decided not to press the issue, but unfortunately that meant we had to guess at her height and arm strength, which is somewhat hard. We couldn’t find any local castle-born 8 year old girls either, the Lords around here are all blessed with sons or cursed with teenagers. So, we guess. Hopefully we got it right, or near enough as makes no matter.
Longclaw is still on sale for $40 off. Unfortunately we didn’t sell as many in April as we had hoped (lousy economy) and so we’re continuing the sale. We still want to clear out more room before Needle arrives. We expect (Hope? Pray?) Longclaw and Needle both sell out rapidly once A Dance with Dragon’s is finished, and once the sales pick up the reduced pricing will likely end, so get it while the getting’s good.
Longclaw on Sale
April 8th, 2009Well folks, the economy sucks doesn’t it? We want to help you out, and we want to clear out more inventory before Needle arrives. So, for the month on April, to celebrate hopefully most of you getting tax refunds, we’ve knocked the price of Longclaw down by $40, now just $200 + shipping. This sale will expire at the end of April, so get it now while you can and save.
First Look Needle Prototype
March 18th, 2009Today we got our first look at the Needle Prototype, it isn’t perfect. The handle parts need to be polished, and the grip is the wrong color (should be black) but other than that it looks good. Needle has a full tang 1045 high carbon steel blade, purists rejoice. Once we get the changes made and another prototype we’ll get it to GRRM for final approval, then to the photographer, then set a price, and then we can start taking preorders.
Ice is having concept art designed now.
Then we’re also thinking about doing a small edition of Khal Drogo’s Arakh just to get a Dothraki weapon style established. The arakh will be using a different product pipeline than Ice so may come out concurrently or prior to it, despite Ice being started first.
International Orders Have Shipped
January 16th, 2009The freight finally arrived this morning, and we worked feverishly to unload, label, and then reload all the boxes. By the time we were done the pile of boxes resembled The Wall in size and temperature (its flipping cold in the Midwest), if not in material.
So at this point, all domestic orders have shipped, and all International orders have shipped. There were a few exceptions but we emailed those individuals.
Longclaw International Orders & Reviews
January 4th, 2009We’ve started shipping International orders. They’ll really go out Monday or Tuesday (we hope) but we’re printing all the labels and whatnot now so that things move more efficiently once they arrive. So if you get an email confirmation of shipping, that is why. Just remember, they’re not actually shipping out for a few more days.
Also, we’ve turned on (well really there was a bug, which we corrected) reviews for Longclaw. A lot of you have been posting reviews as comments to posts here, and that is fine, but we’d like it if you also posted them here. Of course tell all your friends as well, let them know just how much you like yours so they might buy one for themselves. Word of mouth!
So, Longclaw is in stock for domestic shipping, most orders should ship within 1 business day at this point, and it’ll be in stock for International shipping within a few days as well.
Longclaw has Shipped
December 18th, 2008Most domestic orders for Longclaw have shipped out (a few people requested delays). We’ll be putting your tracking numbers into the system just as soon as possible, but possibly not until tommorow morning, but they all went out.
International, now it is looking like they may not go out until after Christmas unfortunately. See, we had all the domestic orders shipped from the port to save time so they could arrive before Christmas, we didn’t ship them ourselves. But the people at the port can’t do international, so we need to wait to ship the international ones until we get the delivery, which will take a week or so. Then with all the holiday days off between now and then a week of business days is a week and a half of actual days so we may not have them in our possession to ship until after Christmas.
Longclaw in stock
December 12th, 2008Longclaw is in stock. Order your’s now if you haven’t yet.
Domestic orders will ship out on Monday, in plenty of time for Christmas.
International orders I’m afraid will be another week, and likely will not make it by Christmas, the warehouse where the swords are at right now can only ship out domestically, a portion will be moved to another location for the International shipping, but that’ll take a week or so for the transit.
Longclaw Shipping Updates
December 4th, 2008We hope to start shipping Longclaw to customers around Dec 16th or 17th. I wish it could be sooner but thats that. That is going to really push Christmas delivery.
In light of this we’ve added an air shipping option to checkout allowing customers to choose air shipping. This is for domestic orders only, and should result in delivery 1 day after we ship it, which vastly increases the chances of Christmas delivery.
For people who have already placed orders, again domestic orders only, who would like to upgrade, we’ll have to process those requests manually, you’ll have to contact us.
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