Wajima, a small town on Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, is famous in the whole country for its centuries old urushi lacquer ware production. This substance, produced with the sap of a tree, “Urushi Tree” (Toxicodendron vernicifluum) that grows in the Far East, is used for the production of tableware and other precious and spiritual items.
In Wajima, the work of urushi has been developed in the most sophisticated way. « Wajima Nuri »is a very slow process that can require up to 30 steps. The work mostly handmade goes from the laquer extraction till the extremely refined decoration of the item through many polishing steps. This work is coordinated by « Nushias”, kind of managers or directors making the link between all craftsmen and customers.
It was with one of them, Shioyasu San, that the Wajima Project project began.
Wajima project is conceived as a family of objects whose formal language plays on the line between digital and organic. The objects, consisting of boxes, vases and other containers, are designed to become experimental canvasses in order to play with the innumerable possibilities offered by urushi. By using contemporary and traditional techniques according to the objects, urushi is applied to wooden forms as well as to the 3D printed or porcelain ones.
