Blue & White Japan - Amy Sylvester Katoh

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      Three hundred and fifty years of lmari. Seventeenth-through-twentieth-century saba cups, from the collection of Susumu Kakitani.

      Blue and white welcome. Umbrella stand and old wooden planting frame covered with paper handmade by Kiyomi Tomi of Wajima and painted by Takaka Fukuchi. A vintage bedcover of patches over patches is the welcome mat.

      Amy Sylvester Katoh

      Photographs by Yutaka Satoh

      TUTTLE PUBLISHING

       Boston • Rutland, Vermont • Tokyo

      Imari dish in the shape of Otafuku, a jolly household goddess.

      For Yuichi, the sun, Mia, Saya, Tai, and Toshi, the stars, Okasama and Obachama. sister moons, and Edmund Quincy Sylvester, who filled the skies with kites and rockets

      No book is written alone. This one is the sum of generous servings of help and cooperation from friends and people we admire who shared their blue and white rooms and collections and recipes without stint. To Sanshiro Ikeda for his blessings, Seiji and Harumi Nibe for creative guidance, Bill and Angela Cruger, Martyne and Tom Kupciunas, Hiroshi and Noriyuki Murata of Kosoen, Chie and Hideki Maegawa, Haruri Ginka Gallery, Mr. and Mrs. Susumu Kakitani, Betty and Gil Hoffman for their consummate hospitality, Henk and Alison Hoksbergen, Tamiko and Tsutomu Makishi, Yasuko and Jissei Omine, Mrs. Yoshiko Shimabukuro of the Daiichi Hotel, Naha, Okinawa, the Matsuda brothers of the Yomitan potters' guild, Sachiko Kinjo, the Kumamoto family of Pension Bisezaki, Katsuko and Shungo Shoji, Hiroyuki Shindo for his indigo inspiration, Kenji and Aiko Tanaka, Yoshihiro Takishita of the House of Antiques for his expertise, Kazuko and Tadashi Morita of Morita Antiques for their knowledge, Yoshichika Kitamura, Chikako and Masanobu Matsumoto of the Gifu Bamboo Society, Shokichi Watanabe and Setsuko Shinoda of Gujo Hachiman, Kibo and Keiko Nomoto, Michiko Natsuhara, Noriko Mikawa, Andrea Heinrichsohn, Kim Schuefftan for his knowledge, Koichi Hama for his calligraphy, Takaka Fukuchi and Takaka Enokido for their dedication, Hiroko Izumi, Mitsu Minowa for her cooking, Kyoko Machida, Kazuko Yoshiura for her sashiko, Reiko Okunushi for her quilts, Paula Deitz for her ikat skies. To you all, and unnamed others, thank you.

      Published by Tuttle Publishing,

       an imprint of Periplus Editions (HK) Ltd.

      © 1996 Charles E. Tuttle Publishing Co., Inc.

       All rights reserved.

      LCC Card No. 95-62393

       ISBN: 978-1-4629-0468-6 (ebook)

      First paperback edition, 2002

       Second printing, 2002

      Printed in Singapore

      Carp and waterfall design with bubbles on a fragment of an old hemp futon cover.

      Contents

      Introduction 7

      Living with blue and white 15

      Entrances 17

      Artful doors 22

      The best rooms 25

      Blue and white details 31

      Floor cushions 33

      All in the details 37

      A fair chair 39

      Confessions of a collector 40

      Porcelain hibachi 46

      Bedside manners 51

      Yukata 55

      A blue and white kitchen 58

      Choosing porcelains 65

      On the table 71

      Blue and white porcelain 73

      Japanese porcelain vocabulary 74

      A story in a soba cup 91

      Blue and white skies 97

      Indigo threads 99

      Indigo textiles 100

      Indigo craftsmen 103

      An indigo primer 105

      Blues in the house 106

      The language of design and pattern 109

      Choosing old indigo textiles 111

      Out of the blue 112

      Banner days 117

      Tenugui 118

      Places, spaces, sources 125

      Blue and white vocabulary 128

      Introduction

      Japan Speaks in blue and white. Azure waves wash over worn Imari shards half-buried in white sand; cotton-ball clouds drift across cobalt skies. Indigo doorway curtains distinguish shop fronts in small mountain towns; old ladies on their way to the neighborhood bath shuffle by in blue and white robes. An unknown dyer has captured the magic of cranes on a graceful padded indigo sleeping kimono. "Mountain flowers like white brocade, valley water brimming indigo," wrote the poet lssa in the eighteenth century. This felicitous marriage of color is loved the world round, but its transcendent expression is found in Japan, where nature's prototype has long inspired artists and craftsmen to apply blue and white to cloth and clay, picture and poem. Blue and white porcelains and textiles in particular have played an integral part in the history of Japan and figure prominently in myth and literature. From the blue and white streamers that helped lure the Sun Goddess Amaterasu out of the cave where she hid in anger at her brother, plunging the world into darkness, to the bolts of blue and white silk given in tribute to Chinese emperors centuries ago, to the blue and white Imari porcelains that were staples in the Dutch East India Company's trade with Europe, blue and white have long been the colors Japan has made its name with throughout the world. Today, new combinations and arrangements are constantly being created, but the essential impact of this basic color combination remains as fresh and powerful as it first was thousands of years ago. The objective reasons for my love of blue and white are easier to explain than the subjective ones. When I first arrived in Japan, fresh out of college, I was struck by the constant presence of these colors. The blue and white aesthetic was one I had grown up with in Massachusetts, and it made me feel instantly at home when I found it repeated everywhere in Japan. Craftsmen responded to the natural world around them with blue and white creations in textiles and ceramics. From futon quilts and cotton kimono, to bowls and plates and porcelains of all kinds, many of the things I used each day were blue and white. Blue and white seemed to surround me and invite me

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