Good ideas

I got the Kapoosh knife block as a present for my husband. He happens to be fond of fairly expensive German knives, and our old knife blocks were poorly-made garbage from college days. Instead of individual slots, the Kapoosh has a block of rubber rods so you can slide the knives in any which direction - even oversized items like cleavers and scissors. (The version we have differs from the one pictured - ours has a smaller section set below the larger one for paring and steak knives. I like having the separate section for easy access to smaller knives.)

The rubber is more gentle on the knife edges than wood, and you can slide the block out and stick it in the dishwasher. It holds quite a bit more than a traditional block, too - because you can (carefully) pack the knives in closer we were able to get rid of a whole extra block! Hopefully they will make replaceable rubber inserts in case they start to break down over time, and you can avoiding having to buy a whole new set...