Japan Basketry | Suruga Bamboo Vase | Autumn

Autumn | Limited Edition | Japan Bamboo Basketry Vase

Thin, elegant strips crisscrossed; rounded, arched into soft curves; diamond spaces filled with light create the unique and distinctive features of Japan's Suruga Bamboo Basketry and this Limited Edition, Japanese vase, Autumn. 

Unique Quality of Suruga Japanese Basketry

So what is so special about Suguga Basketry?  It look so ... "simple". 

This simple look is a bit deceiving --  for it does not mean a simple process.  Much of Japanese basketry relies on flat bamboo strips for weaving material.  But with Suruga Japanese Basketry, the weaving strips are instead made of  ultra-thin, handmade rounded bamboo strips -- strips of such a fine thinness that they can measure as little as 0.8mm (.03 inches) These ultra-thin and delicate-looking rounded strips, and the curved gentle forms they create, are the signature qualities of Suruga Bamboo Basketry —  elegant, airy.

How it's Made

To start, the bamboo strips are fashioned from the larger, dried bamboo culm. These are then scraped with a knife and then split into workable sizes using a hatchet.

Once of a workable size, the bamboo strips are then scraped and even further thinned. These retangular strips and then rounded. The craftArtist (Pictured below, Emi Omura(Kamiya) then uses a special drawplate and one by one, will carefully draw them through a series of successively smaller holes, over and over, thinning and thinning them, rounding them into the many bamboo that will be used for the craftArt vase.

Though these fine, delicate-looking strips measure as little as 0.8mm (0.3 inches) in diameter, the robust quality of the bamboo material remains intact. To create the decorative objects, a frame of bamboo is formed using a heated devise (for malleability). The craftArtist will drill precicesly, and evenly-spaced holes which will selcome each thin strip. The final design takes amazing shape and form through the skills of the craftArtist who then will coerce and encourage tens of, even hundreds of strips, one by one, into gently rounded curves and lines, thus creating the exquisite diamond spaces and the distinct airy form of Suruga style.  The strips must be precisely evenly space to achieve the desired form and the process takes quite a bit of time. This skill of the craftArtist to perfect this shape not easily won and often takes years of training with some artists apprenticing up to 10 years to acquire the skill. 

Smooth, Rounded - The Back Story

These thin strips and rounded form is not by perchance. Though Suruga Bamboo Basketry looks amazingly contemporary in form, its roots can be traced back to 1607 with the arrival of the Shogunate

Tokugawa to Suruga Province (Shizuoka Prefecture) who had an interest in birds. Some of the first works of this bamboo craftArt, it seems, were intended as bird cages since the rounded strips would not hurt delicate wings. From about 1840 the craftArt took on new decorative forms blossoming into the beautiful craftArt it is today. In 1976, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, acknowledging the historical and cultural significance of Suruga Basketry, formally designated it as a National Traditional Craft of Japan

Product Care & Qualities

• Size: 25cm x 25cm depth x 17.5cm height
• Do not wash in water.
• Dust with a soft brush and/or wipe gently with a damp cloth.
• The lovely, glossy-tone color of quality bamboo will increase as the product ages naturally.
• Cylinder is made of black resin
• Includes a gift box.