Traditional Japanese washi paper made deep in the mountains of Toyama Prefecture is being used in a popular range of cute and colorful items.
Items including peach-colored cases for business cards, yellow book covers and mint-green shopping bags are being developed by Sen Ishimoto and his team, who operate a facility offering washi-making classes.
The facility is located in Gokayama in Nanto, Toyama Prefecture. Gokayama is famous for its gassho-style thatched roof house village and is registered as a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Washi paper making goes back 400 years in Gokayama, using the long, durable bark fibers of the kozo tree, a type of mulberry, that are hard to tear or otherwise damage.
The durability of this material is the reason why it is used to repair fusuma sliding door panels and byobu folding screens of cultural asset buildings and sewn together to make small items.
Employed at Gokayama Washi no Sato (Gokayama washi village), the 37-year-old Ishimoto is a washi-paper aficionado and has been fascinated by the paper since he was a student at Musashino Art University in Tokyo.
He first came into contact with washi one summer in Gokayama during his fourth year at university when he stopped by the facility during a club trip. Since he was studying woodworking at the time, he had an interest in paper, as it is made from trees.
His interest in washi grew at such a pace that he began making paper in the bathroom of his apartment. Later that year, he returned for two weeks and assisted in the papermaking process.
He was eventually hired at the facility and began working there after graduating from university in 2008.
A native of Yamaguchi Prefecture, Ishimoto was not familiar with the area, but the landscape greatly influenced his decision to settle and work there.
"With its steep mountains and deep valleys where rivers run through, Gokayama has fantastic landscapes similar to that of Yunnan Province in China, where I once visited," he said. "I thought it would be nice to live here and make washi."
-- Combining new with old
Eight years ago, the Nanto city office asked the facility to make new products. Gokayama had previously been bustling with foreign tourists, but the visitors had all but disappeared just one year after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
"I thought since people aren't venturing into Gokayama, we should create products that can be sent out," Ishimoto said.
He decided to ask two designers, who he knew from his university days, to help him out.
The designers toured the area and noted that the colors of man-made objects, such as the farmers' blue vinyl tarps and the fluorescent tape that climbers wrapped around certain trees, worked well with nature and offered a "nice pop color" to the area.
These patterns led Ishimoto and the designers to combine traditional handmade washi paper with vivid colors. The team named their brand Five, which uses the kanji "go" from Gokayama, meaning "five." Also, the human hand has five fingers. So the branding gives the impression of something handmade.
The following year, Five's products were exhibited at a general merchandise trade fair in Tokyo, where the products' unexpected color and material garnered attention. The products were also showcased at a trade fair in Paris, where buyers from all over the world snapped up Five's offerings. The brand received orders from 20 companies, mainly in Europe.
-- Adaptable like washi
Five's team continues to develop its products with more colors and make design improvements. The brand has also recently made a pouch to hold masks in light of the coronavirus pandemic and opened an online store. The store currently takes only domestic orders, but they are considering accepting orders from overseas. Five's efforts to adapt to market shifts remind us of the flexibility and durability of washi made in Gokayama.
"Washi is a versatile material and can be changed in texture and appearance depending on how it is made," Ishimoto said. "The interesting thing about washi is that it has no fixed purpose, so you might come up with a new use for it that no one else has thought of."
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