MAKOTO | One-of-One Japanese Fine Timber Furniture
A thousand years of life,
kept alive today.
A single fine tree grows in the mountains of Japan, over centuries — sometimes a thousand years. It endures wind and snow, gathers season upon season, until at last the moment comes when it passes into a craftsman's hands.
A craft that reads the nature of the wood and draws out its beauty to last. Temple carpentry, forging, calligraphy, and modern resin — where the four crafts of Japan converge, a single tree changes form and becomes a single piece of furniture.
Once complete, that piece only deepens in character as the years pass. Not a thing simply to be owned, but a companion — to walk alongside you, through time, across generations.
The Four Crafts
the craft
Four crafts come together to bring a single piece into being:
the joining of wood, the forging of steel, the drawing of the brush,
and the giving of new life to timber.
Masters who have each walked a separate path gather around one fine tree.
Inherited handwork and present-day technique —
from their meeting, a piece the world has never seen is born.
The Craft
火と槌が、鋼に命を吹き込む。
熱した鋼を打ち、また熱しては打ち、
少しずつ形を決めていきます。
ひとつひとつ手で鍛えた金具には、
機械では生まれない表情と強さが宿ります。
一筆に、二度はない。
紙に向かい、墨を含ませ、一息で線を引く。
引き直しのきかない緊張のなかで生まれた文字が、
一脚の家具に銘として刻まれます。
釘を一本も使わずに、木を組み上げる。
寺社建築で受け継がれてきた継手と仕口の技で、
木と木をぴたりと噛み合わせていきます。
金具に頼らず木そのものの力で支え合うから、
時を重ねるほどに強く、美しくなじんでいきます。
朽ちゆく木に、新しい生命を。
長い時を経て空洞や割れの生じた銘木に、透明な樹脂を充たします。
失われかけた一本が再び強度を取り戻し、
木目の美しさを宿したまま、家具として生き直します。
古い三つの技に、現代の技が加わります。
Miyadaiku
Miyadaiku
Built without a single nail.
Using the interlocking joinery handed down from shrine and temple construction,
wood is fitted seamlessly to wood.
Held together by the strength of the wood itself, with no fittings to rely on,
the joints only grow stronger — and more beautiful — with time.
Kaji
Kaji
Fire and hammer breathe life into steel.
Heated, struck, heated again and struck once more,
the metal takes its form little by little.
Each fitting, forged by hand, holds a character and a strength
that no machine could ever give.
Shodo
Shodo
One stroke. No second chance.
Facing the paper, the brush takes the ink
and draws a line in a single breath.
Born of a tension that allows no correction,
the character is then inscribed into the piece as its signature.
Resin
Modern Resin
New life for timber once given up to time.
Where age has left hollows and cracks in fine wood,
clear resin is poured to fill them —
restoring the strength once lost, the piece lives again,
the beauty of its grain wholly intact.
the detail
Resin — Modern Resin
New life for timber once given up to time.
Where age has left hollows and cracks in fine wood,
clear resin is poured to fill them —
restoring the strength once lost, the piece lives again,
the beauty of its grain wholly intact.
Wood is alive. Even after it is felled, it goes on breathing — swelling and shrinking, if only slightly. And so we dry it slowly, watching over its moisture with great care. A piece that never warps begins with this unseen work.
A smoothness that invites the touch. Polished again and again, the surface is brought to a finish the palm seems to cling to. A branded mark, inlaid with gold, completes the piece — a note of quiet distinction.
One of one, in all the world. Every piece is set with its own unique serial-number plate — our pledge of quality, and proof that it stands alone. It is the assurance that lets a piece be passed down for generations.
A single fine tree, and four crafts.
The piece born of their meeting is one of one —
found nowhere else in the world.
For the piece made for your space,
we walk beside you from the very beginning.