Milwaukee Blacksmith Tour Event

Join us to welcome Milwaukee Blacksmith to WDCC as new members and take a tour with Shannon Knapp.

Shannon will share their experiences with filming their History Channel TV show and talk about their family journey into becoming one of Milwaukee’s landmark craft businesses. We will take a personal tour of the facility and have a chance to watch the blacksmiths in action! Refreshments will be served.

Explore their website:    milwaukeeblacksmith.com  Once you do, you won’t want to miss this event!

Please note:

Parking lot entrance on Oklahoma Ave. Hard left in lot to Bldg. 24

About Milwaukee Blacksmith:

Milwaukee Blacksmith’s Kent Knapp has been studying blacksmithing since he was 19 years old. He worked with a master blacksmith for a few years in Milwaukee and now runs a traditional blacksmithing business that involves his wife and 4 children.  A huge part of the draw to this art form for the family is Kent’s love for Milwaukee architecture and its rich history with iron. Now Kent expresses his passion for Milwaukee’s history by designing his own ironworks.

After 25 years of marriage, this family has always made a point to find joy in what they do to earn a living. Kent's pursuit of the arts led him to blacksmithing. As a young man, he was introduced to the craft and it caught hold. He served as an apprentice on and off for a cumulative decade, learning the basics through repetition and thousands of hours of grunt work.

Toiling over fire and anvil to hone his skills working in iron fit right in with his love of this city and her architecture. Kent spent years studying our founding fathers, the brewers and builders that gave Milwaukee her distinct look. He shares that passion with every member of our family. You can't drive anywhere in this town without passing a building that Kent knows the history of and will tell you all about. “By age 10, our boys could take you on a tour and would be able to tell you if the ironwork on a building was done by Cyril Colnik, the master blacksmith in Milwaukee 100 years ago. Our personal story *is* our business because our business is our family.”