Japan-Kyoto and Takayama

I’ve had this post in a state of revision and editing for months. Now that I have more time I’ve finished it. It’s the last leg of our trip to Japan last March. It seems a lifetime away now. I have one more in rough draft that will focus on what I’ve learned about Japanese turning so far. In addition, I’m spending the next month(s) finishing my long overdue book on pole lathe turning.

Kyoto is a really nice town and not as huge as Tokyo. As the 8th largest city in Japan, Kyoto’s population is about 1.5 million. The greater Minneapolis-St Paul metro area is 3.4 million for perspective. When we arrived the cherry blossoms were just starting to bloom. This time of year is a very big deal in Japan. People enjoy it by walking around the parks filled with blooming trees, having picnics under them, etc.. it was a beautiful time to be wandering around. We stayed at an amazing traditional Ryokan called Mugen. We were there last year so we knew what to expect. It was nice to be greeted with familiarity when we checked-in. The breakfasts are amazing. They also have a very nice whiskey bar with a huge selection of Japanese and imported whiskeys. If you are in Kyoto please consider staying there. You won’t regret it.

It is definitely getting easier for us to get around Japanese cities. We carry an internet hotspot so we can use Google maps and another app for train travel called Hyperdia. The few days we were in Kyoto were spent visiting some shops that were on our list. We spend a great deal of time on the internet searching, using Google maps and the Google Chrome browser which auto translates websites, to identify these places. Jazmin visited a fabric shop looking for ramie (cloth made from a type of nettle). She also did some recon for suppling her textile work. It’s important to see and feel the cloth before buying. She now gets the cloth for her indigo dyed katazome and shibori sent over from that shop.

We also visited an urushi supply shop where we bought various types of lacquer for use back home. The kind older woman helped us to choose a few types that are a little more specific to our uses. I’m always amazed at the price of the wooden bases that are supplied to lacquer artists. Remember, people turn them with hooks en masse in places like Yamanaka and other turning areas. The turners are amazingly skilled to produce enough to make a decent living.

There is a woodworking school in Kyoto called Suikoushya that I’ve been trying to visit. The location is in a part of town where we have not explored yet. The next visit I think I’ll just make it a point to stop in. I’ve been following them on Instagram for a few years now. Their website is here. They have a list of tool shops as well.

Using the list from Suikoushya’s website we found and visited one that was nearby and easy to get to. I start by asking in the limited Japanese I know “Sumimasen, Ehgo ga wakarimas ka?” “Excuse me, do you speak English?” The answer is usually no or a little. I sometimes say that I’m sorry I don’t speak Japanese. Although I think many shop owners do understand a little English. They are polite and a bit shy in trying. I can understand this. That’s exactly how I feel when trying to speak limited Japanese. But trying goes a long way and I think folks appreciate the attempt. There are so many tools to choose from. I bought a curved bottom kanna and a few gouges for making wagatabon. I could have spent a lot of money in that shop.

We stopped in to the UPI outdoor store where our friend Shingo Fukuhata teaches. Shingo also met us in Miki City for the day when we were there. He told the shop owner that we would stop by. They sell all kinds of outdoor stuff, Morakniv products and even carry Duluth Pack, a local canvas outdoor bag maker in Duluth MN. It was a great visit and I even carved a spoon. The shop managers also tipped us off to a great place to eat around the corner. It was in the back alley and we would have never found it if it wasn’t for their help. It a was an amazing grilled fish place. We sat at the bar and were served by the chef directly. Grilled fish, some fresh sashimi of the day, garden vegetables, and other small dishes that we shared. It was too good.

We also rode bicycles borrowed from the ryokan to a small urushi gallery tucked in a narrow alleyway. The shop was closed when we arrived. We stood in the drizzling rain wondering if they were going to open soon when an old woman with a walker slowly approached us. She started speaking to us in Japanese and pointing to the store front. All I could say was, “I don’t understand, I’m sorry” in Japanese. She smiled and continued to talk at us while walking over to the door next to the shop and ringing the bell. The shop owner opened it and the old woman explained and pointed to us. Thank goodness for that old lady who saved us from standing in the rain! Somehow she knew that the shop owner lived upstairs from the gallery.

The shop owner, who spoke a little English agreed to open the shop for us although it was actually closed in preparation for a new exhibition. We found some really nice lacquerware inside, some of which was made by a man named Fushimi-san. Fushimi has a ton of YouTube videos up about lacquering. I’ve watched them all. We bought two small sake cups made by Fushimi-san. We also learned about an organization called Urushi No Ippo (their website is here) that is promoting the use of traditional lacquerware in schools. They use wooden bowls for their lunch and also take care of them by washing, etc…this is tied to supporting the urushi sap production in Japan. Most urushi comes from China these days as the price is well under half of the Japanese lacquer. But as I am learning, in each area the tree grows the lacquer has different qualities. It was a great connection and I hope we can stop by again on our next trip.

We visited a woodworking friend in a nearby town. Shibaji Ochiai makes very nice wagatabon and other trays. He also turns and is a trained lacquer artist. His wife Sachiko is also a lacquer artist specializing in maki-e. We toured his shop and had some coffee with his family. We really enjoyed their company and hope to visit again in the future.

Shibaji took us to visit his friend, the renowned cooper named Shuji Nakagawa. It was Shuji’s wife’s birthday and one of Shuji’s apprentices was graduating, so there was a cook out to celebrate. After eating Shuji gave us a tour and demonstrated how he worked. It was amazing. I’ve tried my hand at coopering a few times and although I enjoy it very much, at this point, I can’t afford to take the time to develop the skills to make water tight vessels. Maybe someday. But I definitely was inspired by watching him work.

Beautiful—made in collaboration with an Italian designer

After a few days we made our way to our last stop of the trip—Takayama/Hida in Gifu prefecture. It’s a town in a valley surrounded by mountains and pretty isolated in many ways. The train ride was on a local slow train and we passed through great scenery as we ascended the mountains. For such a small isolated town there is quite a large tourist industry there. Some of my friends discussed this with some concern. It’s a double edged sword that’s for sure.

There is a craft and lacquering industry in Takayama called Hida Shunkei. Here is one company’s website. Their style of lacquer has Perilla oil mixed into it. This makes a very transparent finish and often the wood underneath is dyed different colors. Turned cups and bowls, bentwood boxes, and trays are some of the items made in the area. We visited a new friend named Erina who is a woodturner and an accomplished woodworker. She also speaks English so she agreed to translate for me when I visited her master Kawakami Kenichi. Kawakami-San has been turning since the 60’s. He was a very sweet guy. I spent a day with him and Erina turning and discussing the woodturning scene there. He also showed me how he forges high speed steel. I’ll write a separate post on my day with Kawakami-san in the near future.

Kawakami-san, Erina-san and I having some coffee (yes that’s lacquerware), getting to know each other and discussing the days lessons

I’ll discuss the turning specifically and in more detail in a future post, but the style of woodturning in Takayama is very different compared to Ishikawa Prefecture where I studied on the last trip. The craftspeople have to process all their own blanks and dry them, then turn them. They also make a wide variety of products so their lathes are set up very differently than the Yamanaka-style I had experienced. Takayama’s woodturning industry is quite small with only a 3 or 4 working turners—all

old men. Erina is basically the only young person working there today and soon may well be the only woodturner. This concept was very much the topic of Erina and my conversations over the next few days as she took me to visit a few more local craftspeople.

The downside to this part of the trip was that Jazmin got food poisoning and spent several days on a heated toilet seat in the ryokan. Many toilets have heated seats, musical buttons, and built in bidets in Japan—a big contrast to the traditional squat toilets that still persist in some train stations. I thought we would have to go to the hospital, but after a quick online search I found a traditional medicine for stomach problems. We went to the drug store to find it and it worked amazingly.

While Jazmin was back at the ryokan I visited some craftspeople with Erina. First we visited a bentwood box maker named Nishida Keiichi. Keiichi made very nice boxes and has been doing so for 40 plus years. The boxes are made from Hinoki and lashed with Cherry bark. They are then lacquered with the Shunkei style urushi. I can’t remember if he is a 2nd or 3rd generation box maker. I asked if he had a successor to which he replied no. He didn’t want his son to do this type of work. It’s very hard and not much money. Kawakami said the same thing. I learned some cool tricks while I was there including how to make the tool used to make the slit for the bark lashing and the simple clamp used to hold the bent wood together while they dry. I’ve made a lot of bentwood boxes in the Scandinavian tine and svepask style so I was keen to have learned some new tricks.

We also visited a lacquer artist. I have complety lost track of this man’s name. But again he had been applying lacquer for all his adult life. He was working out of a temporary workshop as his was being remodeled. The muro or drying cabinets were huge—you could walk inside them—designed to hold hundreds of objects. The air was thick and humid in the workshop and smelled strongly of urushi.

I was a little nervous because urushiol can become airborne and give a rash on the face, but nothing happened. Phew… Filtering lacquer is a really important part of using it. Dust is always a problem and like varnish if it’s been contaminated, the dried surface will look like it has chicken pox. Then you have to sand it all down and try again. I love it that these craftsfolk can touch raw urushi. They work bare handed because they have built up an immunity to the urushiol. My reactions are getting less and less severe over the many I’ve had in the last 2 years I’ve been working with it.

When Jazmin was feeling better we visited Hida Folk Village just up the road from where we were staying. The village has over 30 historic buildings and was very impressive. The weather was bad that day—snow and wind and temps around freezing. The cold moist air sank into your bones. I had heard about the winters in my reading about Japanese architecture years earlier. I finally understood. After a day of wandering around we went back to the ryokan and sat in the hot springs to warm up. Sooo good.

We also visited the Kusakabe Mingeikan. If you’ve seen books on Japanese architecture you’ve likely come across photos of this place. It’s a wealthy merchants home converted to a folk museum. Website is here

There are always wooden spoons around…this is a very traditional spoon. I met a local maker of these over lunch one day with Erina.

All and all we stayed 5 days in Takayama. We then raced by Shinkansen to Tokyo and Haneda airport and flew home. It was an amazing trip. We learned so much and made more friends and contacts which is very important to us. It’s really just the tip of the iceberg and we are excited to be planning our next trip in October. We’ll see how this Corvid thing plays out, right now I’m in dialog with a few friends and colleagues about teaching at a few smaller venues. Jazmin will learn persimmon tannin dyeing techniques and I hope to go back to Ishikawa to study more woodturning techniques. We also want to collaborate with a few of the craftspeople we have met there.

Jarrod DahlMay 26, 2020Comment

Japan-Kyoto and Takayama

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