Kakitsubata: Japanese tradition and contemporary design

When strolling along sides of the beautiful river in Nakameguro for a relaxed “what is happening in Tokyo” excursion, I was touched by an utterly beautiful white wooden sculpture smiling calmly at me through the open doors of the Kakitsubata shop. Wondering what this place had to put up for sale, I took a peek inside - and stayed for hours. This select shop offers anything from chopsticks to fashion, jewelry to pottery, traditional to contemporary, East to West. If you want to find out more about how they manage to pull such a unique selection together with such a stunning sense of beauty - read on.

Written by Uleshka

PingMag talked to Yukiko Shirouzu, the main buyer of Kakitsubata about how and where they find their excellent products, why they started the shop in the first place and what they exhibit at their Kakitsubata Gallery next doors.

Yukiko Shirouzu, your shop opened on April, 24th in 2006 - so it is not even one year old. What started this precious project in the first place?

The owner of this shop went to Holland about two years ago for a Japan related documentary about Vincent Van Gogh, where she found herself deeply inspired by the overall Dutch design sense. Although it is such a small country, there is so much creativity, a great variety of design and free but deep thinking. All designs had a strong concept, there was always a story behind everything and she never experienced something like this before - on a design level. She wanted to bring some of this to Japan.

decorative plates designed by Hella Jongerious for German porcelain manufacturer Nymphenburg

more decorative plates designed by Hella Jongerious

I used to do furniture for Cibone, and also went to Holland a lot. I got interested in Kakitsubata when I found out about the owner’s idea for the shop and decided to join her.

So the initial inspiration came from the overall sense of Dutch design - but Kakitsubata features various European designers plus Japanese artists as well…?

When we then went overseas to meet and buy from designers in Holland, they asked us about traditional Japanese things like history, the making of things, traditional or contemporary Japanese artists - and we realized, that they knew much more about Japan than we did. We were really ashamed of that, especially since it seems that all Europeans know a lot about their own heritage and culture and where things come from.

Rainbow Moose necklace sculpture designed by Felieke Van der Leest - the head of the reindeer is detachable to act like a necklace hanging upside down with rainbow stripes dangling from the horns

One of many inspirational books at Kakitsubata: this one is about how to knit, but hot!

We felt that those Europeans had a strong identity, compared to Japanese people and felt quite disappointed about that. We started to study a lot, about traditional techniques and also searched for contemporary Japanese crafters and designers to feature in our shop.

Porcelain designs by ON ZA LINE: this is a stunning and unfortunately very fragile ring called ‘She neeeds a treasure’.

plates by the same designer

Yattoko nabe - traditional cooking ware by Shigeru Terachi in a new setting

Rice cooker - beautiful and fast, too!

The idea for the shop and the gallery was then to introduce products which are really carefully done and explain to people how they were made and where they come from. There are some really good things in Japan and we wanted to educate people a little and connect them with both: tradition and what is happening right now.

Now we can even spread some Japanese knowledge when we are in Holland. (laughs)

How would you explain this delicate blend of European and Japanese products in your shop then? What makes you feature certain products?

As I said, we started out having a strong connection to Dutch artists and some brands. Tikklar Makkuum for example make excellent products. Right now we have some of Jurgen Bey’s porcelain and Hella Jongerious’, also some other cups where a designer used traditional motifs found on tiles and now put them on a cup.

Getting to know Hello Jongerious thorugh that porcelain company, we also feature some of her other products.

Hella Jongerious’ Kasese sheep chair for Cappellini, inspired by traditional stools found in Uganda

detailed view of felt and leather mix

From Holland we gradually started spreading. Last time I was in Europe I went to the Ambiente fair in Germany for example. We now feature all sorts of products - rings from a Polish designer, Russian handbags by H2000SR or a dress from Corinne Cobson… We also have some vintage clothing from a special vintage select supplier in Belgium.

dress with kimono sleeves by Corinne Cobson

colorful dress ‘Kitsune’ by Japanese designer c.neeon

As for Japanese products, we have some rather traditional products which we feature constantly e.g. some crystal glass cut in an Edo period fashion, or these really thin drinking glasses or those chopsticks. They are all extremely beautifully crafted.

We try to have a good balance of old and new. We want to sell truly Japanese products but added another contemporary level to them and choose products and designs from people living and working today.

Your selection changes quite quickly I noticed. How many of each piece do you have in stock and how do you decide on what to buy, when you and your owner are traveling separately?

Sometimes we buy only one piece and when that is gone, it’s gone… Sometimes we have 5, 10, … It depends. Some of the Japanese things like Urushi cups are always in stock.

In the beginning the owner and I had a rather different taste, but now we really developed a ‘Kakitsubata style’. You could say that every time we find something, we can almost be 100% sure that the other one would have bought the exact same thing.

Important for us is to bridge East and West and find a similar sensuality, a taste- something which still carries this original sensation and inspiration the owner had when she first came to Holland.

What about the ‘Kakitsubata gallery’ across the road? What do you actually exhibit there?

We have some ‘everlasts’ we like to exhibit (like our Cinderella chair), but we try to change the theme every month and preferably find something that lets people touch the products and learn about how they are made.

At the moment, for example, we have an exhibition about Japanese Urushi - lacquer ware. Apart from introducing new Urushi techniques, we have workshops, too, for showing people how it is traditionally made. Everything from slicing the trees to gain the basic Urushi substance to how to treat the wood, painting, sanding, painting again, etc..

a view inside the gallery with the current lacquer ware exhibition

the small mushroom-looking stools in the middle on display can be used for meditation

It is important for us to not just just sell the products, we want to show how they are made, too. Also, we want to introduce the artists and tell about their stories when people come to the shop. Explain what and how they design things. Doing workshops at the gallery allows people to touch and understand things. And in the shop, we try to sit down with the customers, let them try everything, use books to explain more about the design group artists might belong to or just talk about how and where things are from… We want people to understand why these products we choose are so special and then they are welcome to buy them.

Thank you very much! This is just a small selection of products from Kakitsubata. I highly recommend you to spend some time in Nakameguro next time you come to Tokyo. And if you had your full inspiration from Kakitsubata - you can pop in for a relaxing cup of fresh tea next doors.

Kakitsubata Gallery will extend Taichi Kirimoto’s exhibition until 29th of April. That is because Wajima (the area where the Urushi comes from) just had an earthquake last Sunday morning and Kakitsubata will try their best to help this area to recover. One more reason to go and visit their exhibition if you have some time…

13 Comments

1. Amazing..!! Very great craftsmanship…

   Posted by: Totoro on March 30th, 2007 at 12:58 am

2. The necklace ‘Brenda’ is gorgeous!! Think Ive seen it around the neck of one of Ping’s finest…

   Also the stuff by ON ZA LINE….. is super nice!

   Posted by: SHANTELL MARTIN on March 30th, 2007 at 12:59 am

3. People think that Europeans have more identity than Japanese?
   Soooo wrong.

   Posted by: Badger on March 30th, 2007 at 7:08 am

4. Love the Hangbag!! I want one

   Posted by: Kama on March 30th, 2007 at 9:05 am

5. I want the chopstick :) it will make the food taste more delicious.

   Posted by: Ncus on March 30th, 2007 at 12:22 pm

6. the Urushi bowl is stunning.

   Posted by: yongfook on March 30th, 2007 at 1:25 pm

7. I’m Russian myself and I was surprise by work of “Russian” H2000SR presented here.
   Naturally I immediately googled “H2000SR”…so it’s Dutch designer:-)
   Otherwise very inspiring article. Thanks to Ping Mag keeping me fresh.

   Posted by: AndyAndy on March 30th, 2007 at 5:45 pm

8. Oooops! Really!? Looks like you are right here - and I trusted Shirouzu-san’s explaination… Sorry about that!

   Posted by: Uleshka on March 30th, 2007 at 6:18 pm

9. And c-neeon is German.
   Great article though.

   Posted by: *** on April 6th, 2007 at 1:02 am

10. Sheeeeeeeeee-sh! you are right and here is the proof! http://www.cneeon.de/start.html
    gotta go back and check all the other ones again…. thanks!

    Posted by: Uleshka on April 6th, 2007 at 2:54 pm

11. Inferno! luogo grande per sicuro!

    Posted by: inghilterra on April 9th, 2007 at 9:54 pm

12. Hellofqe - this is just a testing, don’t worry about it

    Posted by: Testerrsg on April 26th, 2007 at 7:07 pm

13. sono eccitato circa questo luogo, buon lavoro!:)

    Posted by: breve on May 26th, 2007 at 12:30 am

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