Don’t "pressure cut" (torque the blades together). This means squeezing harder with your thumb when the scissors start to go dull. it will cause excess wear on the scissors if you do so.
Don’t cut hard surfaces like bone (especially your own!), prawns/lobster shells etc.
Don’t lend your scissors out. Other people have different hands to you - someone else using your scissors with a hard hand will alter the scissors balance and make them feel different (They don't care for them as much as you do and might even damage them!)

If your scissors aren’t cutting as well as you would like, it is probably time to sharpen the blades.

Step 1
Cutalong the full length of the blades through relatively fine thin sandpaper (400-1000) a few times until you get the desired sharpness. If you feel that the sandpaper is not achieving the desired results, you have two options:

1. Take them to a professional sharpener. Or, assuming you are comfortable sharpening knives with a Japanese whetstone, you can sharpen them yourself.
There are two terms to be familiar with:

- Bevel: The slanted edge of the blade on the outside of the scissors (as opposed to the flat side on the inside)
- Burr: the very slight rough edge (or curl) on the opposite side to the side you have just sharpened

Disassemble the scissors by fully unscrewing the adjustment wheel, taking care to note the assembly order and don’t lose the washers!

Note that you must sharpen very carefully in order to avoid removing excess coloured coating from the scissors. Then you can carefully sharpen the bevelled (outside) edge of each blade individually using your whetstone according to your preference or the manufacturer’s instructions. We generally only use the finer (4000 - 6000 polishing) side.

The flat (inside) edge does not need to be sharpened and should remain perfectly flat (once the burr has been evened out, as per below).

Each blade has a slight curve in it to ensure that the scissors cuts right to the tip. This is an indication that they are a well made high-precision tool. For this reason you will need to proceed carefully and sharpen each blade in 2 or 3 stages but the whole process shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.

Test the scissors for sharpness as you progress with the sharpening process as you don’t want to over-sharpen them.

If you get a slight burr (it should never be more than a slight burr!) on the inside of the blades, making a few cuts in a doubled over sheet of paper will remove the burr.

Good care and frequent maintenance is the key to keeping your scissors in great working order over the longer term.