Your thumb finds the button, the blade drops away from the stop pin on caged ceramic bearings, and the handle in your palm is a two-tone slab of ivory and green G10 with a linen texture you can feel through a glove. That is the pitch for CIVIVI's Christmas exclusive: the same Button Lock Elementum II, dressed in a colorway the catalog does not normally carry.
What the exclusive actually changes
Model C18062PK-1 is the button-lock Elementum II with a 2.96-inch satin drop point in Nitro-V. Overall length is 7.06 inches, closed length 4.11 inches, handle thickness 0.51 inch, weight 3.06 ounces. Lock is a button with a spring underneath it, tuned by CIVIVI so the blade resists shaking open but still releases with light thumb pressure. The clip is stainless, tip-up, right side only.
None of that is new. The handle is. Ivory G10 on the show side paired with green, a combination CIVIVI reserves for its own store rather than dealers, which is what the site-exclusive label means here. Buyers who want the standard black or natural versions can still find them at dealers. Buyers who want this one have to go direct.
CIVIVI currently lists the knife with a coming-soon tag and a $77.60 price, so availability will matter more than the spec sheet for the next few weeks.
Why 2.96 inches keeps working
The Elementum line has always been a size compromise that leans toward pockets rather than hands. At 2.96 inches the blade is short enough to stay legal in most U.S. cities and long enough to break down a box without asking your wrist for help. The handle is 4.11 inches closed, which gives most adults a full three-finger grip and a place for the pinky on the butt.
The hollow grind is the part worth noting. CIVIVI runs a hollow grind on this blade rather than the flat grind common on budget folders, which thins the edge geometry and helps a short blade separate material instead of wedging into it. On cardboard and rope that difference shows up immediately.
Nitro-V at 59 to 61 HRC, and what that means at $78
Nitro-V is a nitrogen-bearing stainless built around the AEB-L family, with added vanadium for wear resistance. CIVIVI runs it at 59 to 61 HRC. That is a sensible band for a knife this size: hard enough to hold a working edge through a week of boxes, tough enough that a short blade will not chip when it hits a staple.
It is not a steel that rewards being left wet. With roughly 13.5 percent chromium, Nitro-V sits well ahead of D2 on stain resistance and behind the higher-chromium steels used on saltwater knives, so a wipe after a wet day is still the habit to keep. Sharpening is straightforward on a 600-grit stone, which matters more on a $78 knife than the last few points of edge retention.
The detail that decides it for a lot of buyers is the button itself: a small stainless disc sitting proud of the handle, with a spring under it that gives a short, dry click on release. Press it with a thumb and the blade falls; press it with the pad of a finger and the same thing happens. Nothing about the colorway changes that feel, which is why the exclusive is decoration on top of a mechanism people already trust.