History of Yosegi-Zaiku in Hakone

Yosegi-zaiku grew out of the woodworking villages of the Hakone mountains, along one of the busiest roads in old Japan. This page follows the craft from its Edo-period roots in Hatajuku through the Meiji-era export trade, war and earthquake, to its designation as a national traditional craft in 1984.

Woodworking before yosegi

Hakone had a woodworking tradition long before mosaic patterns appeared. Hakone Town's official yosegi history begins in 1556, with the production of hikimono, lathe-turned wooden ware, in Hatajuku. The mountains supplied timber of many species, and the settlements along the road supplied customers.

That road was the Tokaido, the highway that connected Edo (present-day Tokyo) and Kyoto. Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, in its multilingual interpretive text for Hatajuku, calls the village the birthplace of yosegi marquetry. Travelers crossing the steep Hakone pass stopped at teahouses and inns, and local woodwork, known collectively as Hakone-zaiku, became a souvenir of the journey. Hakone Town's timeline notes that the 1791 illustrated guide Tokaido Meisho Zue introduced Hakone-zaiku as a specialty of Yumoto-chaya.

The Edo period: Hatajuku and Ishikawa Nihei

Hakone Town's history says yosegi-zaiku was developed in Hatajuku in the late Edo period, and that it is said to have started when Ishikawa Nihei, a Hatajuku resident, focused on the many tree species of the Hakone mountains and made trays and boxes from woods of different colors and grains. The town's timeline dates his development of the techniques to around 1845 to 1848. The national ministry's text gives his dates as 1790 to 1850 and notes that exactly when the technique emerged is unclear.

Earlier written records already mention mosaic woodwork in Hakone. Hakone Town's timeline records that in 1820 the Dutch Japan scholar it names as Fissel saw and bought yosegi at Hakone and Yumoto, which the town calls the first appearance of yosegi-zaiku in Hakone. The ministry's text and the traditional craft association both point to the German physician and botanist Philipp Franz von Siebold, who described the technique in the record of his 1826 journey to Edo. The association notes that Siebold described marquetry being used for furniture and furnishings, a reminder that the craft's roots include high-end goods, not only souvenirs. Mosaic woodwork also appears in Tenpo-era (1830 to 1844) prints, including a Tokaido sugoroku board game and a Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido print of Odawara by Ando Hiroshige and Utagawa Toyokuni.

According to the traditional craft listing, early Hakone yosegi was mostly ran-yosegi (random mosaic) and patterns made of single repeated units. Hamamatsuya, a Hatajuku workshop run by Ishikawa Nihei's descendants, says the original designs are said to have been modeled on the stone paving of the old Tokaido road.

Opening to the world

When Japan opened its ports in the 1850s, Hatajuku's craftspeople followed the new customers. Hakone Town's timeline records that after the port of Shimoda opened in 1854, Myogaya Hataemon of Hatajuku went there to sell Hakone-zaiku, and that in 1859 Myogaya Hataemon, Kanazashi Rokuzaemon and others from Hatajuku opened stores in Yokohama.

The Meiji period: new techniques

The Meiji era (1868 to 1912) reshaped the craft. The traditional craft listing explains that at the beginning of Meiji, a marquetry technique from the Shizuoka region was introduced to Hakone, and this became the ko-yosegi, small-piece marquetry with continuous patterns, that is typical today.

Hakone Town's timeline records several inventions in quick succession:

  • 1892: Shirakawa Senseki of Yumoto-chaya created the current technique of wood inlay, mokuzogan, which uses pictures rather than geometric patterns.
  • 1894: Okawa Ryujiro of Yumoto invented the himitsu-bako, the secret box.
  • Around 1897: Yamanaka Tsunetaro of Odawara invented kumiki-zaiku, interlocking wooden puzzles.
  • 1909: The Hakone Products Trade Association was organized.

Taisho and export

In the Taisho period, Hakone's woodwork found buyers overseas. The town's timeline records that around 1912 production of coaster sets and powder containers for export flourished, that exports rose during the economic boom of the First World War, and that pen boxes covered in zuku veneer became popular around 1919. In 1923 the Great Kanto Earthquake damaged many Hakone-zaiku factories.

War and recovery

During the Second World War the trade association was dissolved, and in 1943, according to the town's history, Hakone-zaiku factories switched their production to munitions. Recovery came quickly after the war. Hakone-zaiku won many prizes at a Kanagawa Prefecture craft exhibition in 1950, the Federation of Hakone Product Cooperatives formed in 1951, and in 1955 the first postwar exhibition devoted only to Hakone products was held. With Japan's high economic growth, exports increased.

The postwar years also changed technique. A Hakone local magazine explains that yosegi was originally shaved with a special plane and applied to boxes with a glue made from gelatin; after the war, stronger adhesives allowed thicker pieces to be joined, making seamless solid yosegi possible. Web Japan dates the muku, or solid, method to the Showa period. See zuku and muku.

Designation as a traditional craft

On May 31, 1984, the Minister of International Trade and Industry designated Hakone Yosegi Zaiku a traditional craft. The production area association listed by the national craft showroom is the Odawara Hakone Traditional Marquetry Cooperative. Following the designation, according to a Hakone local guide, Hakone Town established the Hatajuku Yosegi Kaikan to preserve the craft's techniques; it displays tools and works and offers a coaster-making class.

The craft today

Hakone's makers today range from long-established family workshops in Hatajuku and Yumoto to younger independent artisans. Web Japan profiles Ken Ota, who began training at a yosegi workshop in 2003, went independent in 2012, and creates new patterns and everyday items such as pens and buttons. Groups such as the Karakuri Creation Group develop new mechanical puzzle boxes based on Hakone's tradition. Museums in Hakone-Yumoto and near the Hakone checkpoint, covered on the visiting page, keep historic pieces on display.

Sources

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