Besides being known for its Buddhist temples and also having been the home of haiku poet Masaoka Shiki the city of Matsuyama on the island of Shikoku is where the patient craft of Yamato brings to life handmade leather sandals.
They also had a line made of washi paper which proved popular on fashion runways and in some hotels but its production is currently suspended.
Besides offering a gallery of designs used for this line, the British Site of Yamato tells us that "Washi is a term employed to describe the hand-manufactured paper, usually made from bark fibres, wood pulp or rice envelope. This technology was imported from China by the Buddhist monasteries in the VIIIth century for the religious tradition diffusion. Then, the Japanese artists employed the washi for the interior decoration (sliding doors, lampshade…) and paper mill items".
In Footprints of the Handmade Variety (Pingmag Make), Takafumi Suzuki the president of Yamato,Tamotsu Tokorotani, explains that the main difficulty in producing their high end goods is training people in China and Vietnam where some of the work is outsourced to meet their exacting standards.
This is the reason why the final assembly is made in Matsuyama, for the sake of consistency.
Tamotsu Tokorotani reflection on how his father inspired his business approach is illuminating "My father has something he likes to say, and it’s become a favorite
motto of mine, “Companies and people always have a sunrise.” Even when
things don’t go well, you don’t let it get you down, but you keep up
the momentum of the sunrise. People will gather and bow down to the
sunrise, but they turn away from the sunset".
On their project list, a collaboration with an Italian shop.
From the Yamato British Site, I chose the Gold Crane design as an illustration.
To put it in context, we are told that "The crane is omnipresent in the Japanese pictorial universe.
Its majestic scale can reach the size of a man, it is symbol of
longevity, prosperity and of hope. It accompanies the wedding ceremonies".
This was Tokyo Thursdays #34
Related: ‘Umbrellas of Happiness’, Hand Crafted by Mr. Kitazawa