[VILLAGE Report vol.3] The Birthplace of Japan’s Oldest Porcelain | Saga Prefecture

West from Fukuoka. This issue’s village is a place that could be called the origin of Japanese ceramics.

The oldest in Japan as porcelain

According to official information from Saga Prefecture, Imari-Arita ware is “the oldest in Japan as porcelain”. Its history spans about 400 years.

Until then, what existed in Japan was earthenware made from clay. White and thin, and ringing like metal when tapped, porcelain must have seemed astonishing to people at the time.

Ceramics with three names

These ceramics are known by three names.

In Japan, they are called “Imari ware” and “Arita ware”. Overseas, meanwhile, they are known as “Ko-Imari”. It was made in Arita and shipped from Imari Port. Both names, the production area and the port, remained.

This episode gets to the heart of craftsmanship. Where something was delivered from can leave a name behind just as much as where it was made.

First Raku, second Hagi, third Karatsu

Karatsu ware has long been cherished by tea practitioners through this saying. According to official information from Saga Prefecture, its defining qualities are "an earthy, subdued clay character and a simple, rustic style". Fired in a climbing kiln, it is a "vessel to be nurtured," whose expression changes the more it is used.

It was designated a national Traditional Craft Product in Showa 63 (1988). That was after four centuries of history.

Those left outside national designation

There is one striking sentence in materials from Saga Prefecture.

In addition to the 2 nationally designated items, "many excellent craft products that inherit traditional skills and techniques are not eligible for national designation because their production areas are small in scale, among other reasons".

Small in scale. For that reason alone, excellent handwork remains out of the spotlight. The prefecture independently designates these items as Traditional Local Products.

These are exactly the kinds of things we are looking for.

Being small in scale is not a flaw

Not being able to mass-produce means that each piece is made with care. The only problem is the lack of a way to communicate that value.

The power to make already exists. What remains is the power to deliver.

Next issue, we head to Nagasaki, a city of islands and slopes.

References: Saga Prefectural Government, "Imari-Arita Ware" and "Traditional Crafts of Saga Prefecture"; Saga Prefecture official tourism site "Asobo Saga"

—The Value Village Editorial Team