THE STORY 26 FALL WINTER

I used to love watching the shadows of plants swaying in the wind beyond the shoji screens. I often wondered if it might be possible to capture that scene just as it was—the faintly lit landscape, with only the silhouettes moving quietly—and somehow enclose it within a piece of cloth. One day, while I was drawing patterns of wild mountain plants with this thought in mind, I remembered a piece of fabric I had once seen laid out in a sampling room at a factory in Kyoto. It was an incredibly delicate fabric, made by layering washi paper over a thin cloth, so fragile that light could pass straight through it.

The technique of printing washi onto fabric is made possible through hand-block printing, a craft rooted in the culture of yuzen dyeing. It is not a single process or technique, but the result of a succession of handcrafts that have been cultivated and passed down for generations in Kyoto. The process begins by carefully securing the fabric without the slightest distortion onto a long worktable covered with a transparent film. From there, each stage is meticulously carried out, one piece at a time. Heat is continuously sent up from beneath the table, with careful measures taken to prevent the resin from seeping through to the reverse side of the fabric, while also keeping the paste from spreading beyond where it is meant to go. Even in the height of summer, no fans are used. Even the tiniest invisible particles of dust in the air can affect the quality, so the work continues in a quiet atmosphere of concentration and tension.

When it comes time to apply the washi, three artisans work in perfect rhythm, layering the paper onto a single piece of fabric. Fabric, resin, washi, and then resin again. After passing through layer upon layer of processes, only the botanical patterns remain on the cloth. There is a reason behind everything—the shape of the screens, the order of each step—and the wisdom accumulated over many years has become so deeply embedded in the artisans’ hands that it appears almost instinctive.

By six-thirty the following morning, the fabric had already been taken to the steaming factory. The resin is fixed onto the cloth with heat at 150 degrees Celsius, after which the fabric is slowly washed in well water. Only the unnecessary washi is washed away, leaving behind the plants I had drawn, quietly held within the cloth. As I watched the fabric ripple gently across the surface of the water, it seemed as though the grasses and flowers I had once seen swaying beyond the shoji were now dancing there, in the water, exactly as they had been.

It takes several factories and the hands of many artisans to complete a single piece of fabric. Each person carries out their part of the work with trust in the next, passing it carefully from one process to another. It is this invisible relay that holds the fabric together.

After seeing the washed fabric off on its way to the next factory, I had breakfast at a traditional kissaten nearby with the chairman of the dyeing factory. He told me that, in the old days, they would bring the fabric in first thing in the morning, then come here for breakfast while waiting for it to finish steaming.

I felt so happy to be part, even just for a little while, of the legacy built up through all the layers of time that everyone has shared over the years. As I waved goodbye from the taxi, I found myself filled with a quiet sense of happiness, thinking once again: this is why I could never stop making things.