An Astonishing Array of Ceramic Mosaic Tiles Comprise a Japanese Museum’s Historical Collection

An Astonishing Array of Ceramic Mosaic Tiles Comprise a Japanese Museum’s Historical Collection



Craft
Style
Heritage

#architecture
#Japan
#mosaics
#museums
#tile

June 24, 2022

Kate Mothes

An Astonishing Array of Ceramic Mosaic Tiles Comprise a Japanese Museum’s Historical Collection

Graphic © Ryota Murase. All images courtesy of the Mosaic Tile Museum, shared with authorization

In the Gifu Prefecture of Japan, a nucleus of creativity blossomed in Kasahara City, Tajimi City, a lot more than a millennium back. Known for its record of ceramic creation, the area celebrates its distinctive heritage with a spring and autumn competition, a ceramics-themed park, and pottery retailers that teach readers the tradition. Between its most recent sights, set in a rolling green, the Mosaic Tile Museum Tajimi focuses on a additional current factor of the ceramics marketplace.

Following World War II, reconstruction efforts essential developing elements, and tiles were abruptly in high demand. In its heyday in the mid-1900s, Kasahara Town had much more than 100 tile factories, and the fragile pieces were even now getting used for the development of high-increase properties in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Shortly, international competition and new materials hampered local manufacturing and the ornate tiles fell out of style, discarded when new properties changed previously types. All around that time, a group of locals who recognized the historic importance of these tiles began to salvage as a lot of as they could from buildings scheduled for demolition. “The volunteers fondly remember how their requests were being at first fulfilled with bewilderment, but their activities have resulted in the preservation of the exceptionally scarce products forming our enormous selection today,” states a statement on the museum’s internet site.

Housed in an architecturally exuberant expression of the romantic relationship among ceramic and the earth, the constructing was made by architect and historian Terunobu Fujimori to nestle sympathetically in the surrounding landscape. Today, the museum’s collection holds extra than 10,000 individual tiles, sample publications or boards portraying tile solutions, instruments and utensils, and objects such as wash basins, bathtubs, and export products.

You can find additional data on the museum’s web-site.

 

Graphic © Akitsugu Kojima

Image © Akitsugu Kojima

Impression © Katsuhiko Kodera

Visuals © Katsuhiko Kodera (still left) and Akitsugu Kojima (proper)

Impression © Akitsugu Kojima

Graphic © Akitsugu Kojima

#architecture
#Japan
#mosaics
#museums
#tile

 

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