Kimono Flea Market ICHIROYA's News Letter No.65

[ichiro]

Dear Customers & Friends

Hello from Ichiro. This is Kimono Flea Market ICHIROYA's News Letter No.65 .
Today is the day of election of the House of Councillors. I and Yuka went the election in the morning. We are very interested in the result of the election, because there are many difficult issues here in Japan. The focus of this election is public pension. Public pension systems were reformed approx a month ago, but people don't think the all problems are solved. Because of the sharp decline in the number of births, and very low profit from managing accumulated insurance premiums, people ( and maybe also decision-makers) are worrying about new system. Along the arguments, many troubles and problems were revealed ---
* There are many citizens who have signed up but are delinquent in their payments. Government put advertizement to persuade the young to pay pension on TV. Very popular actress appealed to pay pension premium, but later she was unveiled that she didn't pay pension premium herself.
* Some cabinet colleague and Member of Parliament are came to know that they had unpaid periods of pension premium. One right after the other, MP names who have unpaid period are publicized - includes opposition leader, popular newscasters, and some dicision-makers - and finally we came to know also Prime Minister Koizumi had un-paid period. Mr. Koizumi never apologized about it.
* We came to know that many parts of accumulated insurance premiums are lost. Bureaucracy already used it for buying expensive official cars, building facilities which are not popular and in the red, and others. Of course there are many other difficult and important issues. We will know the public willingness tomorrow.

Today I would like to write about 'komon'. We offered 'katazome katagami', stenciled papers twice before, and some customers already noticed how fantastic they are. ( They were sold rapidly. But today we have listed 19 more pack. ) Komon means 'very small('ko') pattern('mon')'. Now 'komon' has two meanings, another meanings is 'kimono with repeated pattern'. So 'komon' fabric will be komon kimono always, but their meanings are not completely same. Especially microscopic komon pattern fabrics have been made in Tokyo ( 'Edo'- ancient name of Tokyo ), so it is called Edo-Komon, and is considered to be the best of komon. Edo komon has very very small pattern, so it looks solid from distance, and if you see from very near you come to know it has very small pattern on it. Smallest pattern has 1000 dots in 3-cm-square(1.2-inch-square)!
Here is the sample pages of komon pattern.
www.ecopolis.city.itabashi.tokyo.jp/edu/shakai/itabashi/dentou/komon/katagami/katagami.htm

Edo komon was become very popular among samurai in Edo period (1603-1867). Samurai used komon fabric for their kami-shimo. Because they were not allowed to wear luxuriously, so they enjoyed the fashion and luxury with very small komon pattern, which looked solid at a glance. Such aesthetic feeling are come down to the modern ladie's komon kimono. Actually we heard that people who wear kimono very often find fine Komon patterned kimono most charming after having worn many kinds of kimono.

Here is the page of Mr. Kobayashi, famous dyer of Tokyo-Some-Komon.
www.ecopolis.city.itabashi.tokyo.jp/edu/shakai/itabashi/dentou/komon/komon_top.htm

You can see the tools of komon katazome, and his craft room. First two photos are the paste, which are used to put through the katagame for resisting from dyeing. There also is a photo of katagami(stencil paper), and a photo of carving knifes for making katagami.
www.ecopolis.city.itabashi.tokyo.jp/edu/shakai/itabashi/dentou/komon/saka/zairyoudougu.htm

Here is the page of process of dyeing komon. First photo is the scene of making katagami, and the second and forth one is the scene of put paste on the fabric with katagami. Paste makes patterns, which resist to be dyeing. Katagami is small, so when dye one bolt, dyer must repeat this process again and again with matching the pattern in the hems. This process is said to be most important one. Fifth photo ( No.3) is the scene of the drying the paste. In the six photo ( No. 4), fabric is dyed with its background color dyestuff.
www.ecopolis.city.itabashi.tokyo.jp/edu/shakai/itabashi/dentou/komon/saka/index.htm


Here is the page of famous katagami maker Tsuguo Nakajima.
www.mpec.tsu.mie.jp/kyoiku/kyouzai/MDBHTML97/HTML/SANGYO/ISEKTGM/ISEKTGM.HTM
www.mpec.tsu.mie.jp/kyoiku/kyouzai/MDBHTML97/HTML/SANGYO/ISEKTGM/ISEKTGM.HTM
www.mpec.tsu.mie.jp/kyoiku/kyouzai/MDBHTML97/HTML/SANGYO/ISEKTGM/ISEKTGM.HTM

Most marvelous thing about katagami of Edo komon is they were all hand made. When I see their microscopic pattern, I can not easily imagine they were all hand carved one small hole to one hole. Its patterns were not calculated by computers, but they are carved with free hand! Its pattern must be the same, and to match the pattern hem's part must be precisely the same. Mr. Nakajima says it takes more than ten years to become professional of katagami maker, but I still be incredible how they can do like this work. Mr. Nakajima also says the katagami maker inspired their spirits to small katagami, and its beauty, accuracy and imperceptibility are their lives themselves.
We are very happy if you could feel the spirits of katagami maker from our katagami, which we offered today. They are from pre WWII, and all have microscopic and tasteful patterns.
Today we also have listed some unique vintage kimono and yukata bolt. For men we have listed LL size yukata. We are sorry but we only have 5.
www.ichiroya.com/item/search.php?md=0712

Thank you for reading to the end. We wish you a nice summer Sunday!