{"id":2872,"date":"2026-06-28T09:34:52","date_gmt":"2026-06-28T09:34:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/?p=2872"},"modified":"2026-06-29T07:59:32","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T07:59:32","slug":"carving-a-future-for-traditional-crafts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/carving-a-future-for-traditional-crafts\/","title":{"rendered":"Carving a future for traditional crafts"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Text and photos by Emma Cooney<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Interpretation by Luna Saito<\/b><\/p>\n

In a house that smells like lumber, Hitomi Shiotani sits on her knees, hunched over as she delicately carves lines into a piece commissioned by a local Kyoto temple. Wood shavings are swept into piles on tatami mat-covered floors, stuck to her socks, and strewn on just about every surface of the workshop.<\/span><\/p>\n

While she works on smaller decorative pieces, Tomoya Yokooji, Shiotani\u2019s sensei, carves out the face of a Buddha on the other side of the room. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"A
Hitomi Shiotani sits at her workbench at the Wood Sculptor Yokooji workshop. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Shiotani, 22, is part of a new but shrinking generation of artisans who are carrying on Japanese traditional crafts. She works at <\/span>Wood Sculptor Yokooji<\/span><\/a>, a company with four workers, which operates out of the home of Yokooji and his wife and fellow artisan, Nobuko.  <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think traditional crafts are becoming more difficult to sustain,\u201d Yokooji says. \u201cFewer people want to do this work, and fewer people even know these skills exist, so there\u2019s less demand for them. That\u2019s why I think it\u2019s important for craftspeople to share and promote what they do.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the World Economic Forum, the number of Japanese artisans declined from over 280,000 in 1983 to around 60,000 in 2016, a 75% drop. <\/span><\/p>\n

Traditional Japanese crafts are at risk of dying out in a constantly modernizing Japan, but Kyoto continues as the \u201ccenter of Buddhist art,\u201d Yokooji explained. <\/span><\/p>\n

Shiotani said she could only come to Kyoto to learn to create these specific Buddhist wood carvings. She spent four years at a specialized university for <\/span>mokuchokoku,<\/span><\/i> traditional Japanese wood carving.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the past, teams of as many as 30 people might have worked on a project, Shiotani said. Now, one or two people typically work on a piece. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think wanting to carry on someone else\u2019s passion is something universal,\u201d Kokooji said. \u201cThat\u2019s how these traditions have been passed down, and I hope we can do the same.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Both Shiotani and Yokooji spoke about childhood memories that inspired their love for <\/span>butsuzo<\/span><\/i>, Japanese Buddhist wood carving. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy dad was an ordinary office worker, but he loved DIY projects, so there were always carving tools around the house,\u201d Yokooji said. \u201cI used to play with them like they were toys.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

On a school trip to Nikko to see local temples, Yokooji said, \u201cI was really moved by the carvings and decorations. That was where it all started for me. I\u2019ve always loved the atmosphere of temples and grew up feeling close to them.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Similarly, Hitomi recounted her grandfather\u2019s hobby of making butsuzo and how her grandparents\u2019 house was filled with decorative pieces. <\/span><\/p>\n

They both expressed that as they sit in their workshop, carving out intricate designs into various types of wood, they feel as though they are meditating. <\/span><\/p>\n

For the past three months, Hitomi has been demonstrating her work at the <\/span>Kyoto Museum of Crafts and Design<\/span><\/a>. But, a greater question lingers: How will Kyoto get more young people to carry on these traditional arts? <\/span><\/p>\n

Masaki Higashimura, senior advisor to the Kyoto Museum of Crafts and Design, said that one of the museum\u2019s priorities is to engage younger generations through education, experience and merchandising. <\/span><\/p>\n

If younger people buy work at the museum and incorporate it into their daily lives, the traditional crafts will live on, Higashimura said. Kyoto students have free access to the Kyoto Museum of Crafts and Design, and the museum itself donates picture books about crafts to local elementary schools. <\/span><\/p>\n

Challenges persist for artisans: deforestation causing material shortages, rising tool prices, fuel costs and job scarcity. Hitomiexplained that fewer people nowadays are funding temples, which in turn means artisans have less work. <\/span><\/p>\n

While she said she doesn\u2019t believe the Buddhist statues will ever completely vanish, some of the tools used to create them may. \u201cThe smaller tools are declining in demand,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re increasing the price of the tools.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Yokooji said there are fewer artisans nowadays who even know how to make the carving tools. The Buddhist statues would not exist without every distinct artisan and their niche craft. To make one piece, specialty craftsmen need to work together. <\/span><\/p>\n

While traditional crafts exist all over Japan, Hitomi and Yokooji both ended up in Kyoto for the same reason: the city\u2019s industry is the biggest and most abundant, and many artisans live there.  <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt genuinely makes me happy when young people say they want to do this work. It reminds me of when I was young and chose this path,\u201d Yokooji said. \u201cI just hope it can be passed on from one generation to the next.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new but shrinking generation of artisans is carrying on Japanese craft traditions<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":2876,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[5,135],"class_list":["post-2872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts","tag-featured","tag-highlight"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/EMMA-Feature-027-WEB.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2872"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2872\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2957,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2872\/revisions\/2957"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2026kyoto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}