Jodi Sam

natural patterns & colours—a beautiful hand carved indigo dyed "ume" plum dish by .oku, (shinataro oku from kagoshima) made of rare wood "scraps" that would have been otherwise discarded. the colour of the botanical dye and the textures are just gorgeous.🌿🪵

oku-san was in vancouver before stopping in the uk & france for his chopstick making workshops last month, which i was lucky to have participated in. due to time constraints, the chopsticks were already shaped and only 2 sides needed to be further shaved down using the traditional japanese hand plane, kanna. interesting note: with japanese kanna, the blade is pulled towards you, whereas with western planes, it is pushed away from you. kanna, utilizing your entire upper body, allows you more control and for thinner shavings. sanding and oil finishing followed.

my chopsticks (hashi) were made of hardwood used in columns, windows & door frames of buddhist temples called "tabu". just love the natural wood grain/patterns of both the chopsticks and dish. he brought with him various rare woods that would normally not used for chopsticks for us to try our hands on. and even served newly harvested yame sencha from a farmer close by his workshop during our break! 🍵

thank you oku-san & his team as well as nikkei centre for organizing this fantastic workshop, part of their "essence of japan" cultural programing!