An Exhibition That Celebrates The Beauty Of Japanese Wood
An ongoing exhibition showcases the quality of the country’s cypress and cedar.
By Tay Suan Chiang,
A sushi counter made of hinoki or Japanese cypress is often the mark of a quality Japanese restaurant. What makes it so valued is its fine wood grain, even tone and near absence of any knots.
The Yoshino forest in Okuyamato region has mountains full of cedar and cypress trees, planted in a dense mass up to four times the size of an average forest. Each tree is thinned repeatedly and carefully tended over 200 years before they are harvested, resulting in straight, uniform trunks of timber.
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For a close up look at Yoshino wood and to even buy some pieces, check out Into The Woods, an exhibition organised by the Nara Prefectural Government, Okuyamato Migration and Exchange Promotion Office. It shines the spotlight on 16 artisans from Okuyamato and their creations.
This is the second time that Into the Woods is taking place in Singapore, after a successful run in 2019. Its curator, Jackson Tan, founder of Black design firm, says: “We wanted to extend the showcase to introduce the wider Okuyamato area through a larger variety of craft and products, and visual stories of the makers from the Yoshino mountains.”
He adds: “We hope visitors can appreciate Okuyamato and Yoshino wood through the makers’ sharing of their lives and aspirations, the dedication of the community to revitalise their industry and city, and an appreciation of the craft unique to the region.”
All the items on display are for sale. Besides the wooden items, there will also be a selection of dried and processed foods and tea from some of the region’s producers.
Into The Woods is now on till February 21 at Lumine Singapore, #02-20 The Central
Yoshitani Mokkosho says their cypress tongs are so pliable that you don’t need to use much strength to pick things up with them. They also highly recommend using the tongs for picking up snacks so that no one will end up with greasy fingers.
Made with natural offcuts from the mill, Hirohashi chopsticks protect Okuyamato’s resources and sustain the growth of Yoshino forests. The chopsticks are individually handcrafted, highlighting their beautiful colour and grain.
Shiroi Inu Anjing Putih believes in keeping things simple but with a hint of surprise. What looks like a wooden rectangular block actually holds a vase-shaped like a test tube. The well-defined grain patterns of the cypress and cedar woods are clearly seen on the boxes. While meant to be vases, they make good drinking vessels too.
“En la da” means “just a box” in Swedish, but the studio’s founders Tomohiko and Yukiko Sekiya want to do more than that. The couple’s design philosophy fuses the refined qualities of Northern European furniture with the delicate sensibilities of Japanese furniture. This bench is made using traditional techniques but with a contemporary aesthetic.
Most wooden chairs come in straight lines, but those produced by woodmaker Kenta Hirai of studio Jig stand out for their curves. Hirai specialises in the technique of free form lamination, using thin slices of Yoshino cedar layered over each other and then crimping them into shape. The technique is possible only because of the pliable quality of Yoshino wood.
This article first appeared in The Business Times