sho-shin

Advice on Polishing

People ask how to go about having their sword polished.
My Advice: Find the quality of polish you admire. Ask the owner who polished that sword and contact that polisher directly. NEVER have a dealer or go between take your sword for polish. They charge a large percentage and contract for cheap work.
Rule: Pay as little as possible for a sword - but always pay as much as possible for quality polish. You do not want to have poor polish work.
Therefore never use a dealer for a go-between; always write the actual polisher and send your sword to that person, yourself.

Note on Care of Books

With books, one mar or fingerprint to the ink of the pictures - one crease or crush to a page - any difference from brand-new, creates value loss and permanently sets the book back. Just as chips in a blade - or chips in the lacquer of a Saya create value loss. It is overt damage.

"Normal use" is damage to books.

Anyone having reference or collector books, antique book collectors or curators, all have the same, expected and specific method of handling books. - This is similar to proper sword etiquette being the only allowable method.

Important Note on Collecting

It is perhaps a partial statement, but none the less not far-fetched, to say that the sword appraisal agencies and sword clubs in modern Japan have made up and created a mind set for today's collectors; and have set them like sheep for the polished, papered "Packaged" sword products. - Little notice has been taken that the real Samurai swords, the actual swords of the Samurai - are being wholly altered, ground up by polishing and re-constructed, essentially ending their specific histories.

When a Temple or Shrine is completely reconstructed; or moved down the street to make way for a parking garage - is it the same?

One of the aspects for collectors is certainly polished, and papered swords; - While the other, however, are original, real Samurai antique swords. Nihonto.

The two are not the same

Many of the Japanese collectors would never bother changing, papering or altering their swords at all - of course, the why of this hasn't been loudly preached.

Selling before Buying

My Advice: They will sell when they sell. They really will. They'll sell tomorrow - or maybe within the year.
How will it feel looking back in five years, if your sale items sell in a month - or in a year and half?
Once sold, they are gone and not before.

Generally, it doesn't matter - only that they sold at some point and that you didn't let a thing you wanted, get away.

Otherwise, you end up with the things that didn't sell.