Three generations of hands have pulled fibre from water in this same room, one sheet at a time.
Four fibres, four textures. Hover to feel the grain and see the strands that make each sheet.
Long, resilient fibres — strong enough to fold a thousand times without breaking.
Fine and lustrous, with a faint sheen once used for banknote stock.
Semi-translucent and glass-smooth — cannot be cultivated, only foraged.
Long threads suspended in the sheet, like mist caught mid-drift.
Nothing here has changed in seventy years, and nothing needs to.
Kozo branches are cut in winter, when the fibre runs strongest and coldest.
Bark is steamed loose from the branch, then the outer skin scraped by hand.
Fibres are beaten on stone until they separate into a fine, even pulp.
A bamboo screen is dipped and rocked, layering fibre in even sheets.
Sheets are brushed onto wooden boards and left to dry in open air.
The workshop is small. We see visitors by appointment, a few hands at a time.