植物×匠

See up-close models of kigumi woodwork, kayabuki thatching, hiwadabuki cypress bark roofing, and kokerabuki bark roofing. The roofing models show the internal structure of the roofing type for easy understanding of the procedure and parts that make up the roof. The displays offer a deeper appreciation of the fine points of professional roofers’ skills.

A wide variety of plants are introduced from the sugi cedar, hinoki cypress, and pine used for building to the bamboo used for the internal structure of earth-plastered walls and interior woodwork, the gama bulrush woven for ceilings, the igusa rush woven mats used for tatami flooring, and susuki grass and yoshi reeds used for thatching.

Lifestyles in Japan have long been sustained by the bounty of nature and its cyclical use in rural areas. The displays explain visually the close connections between local forests and kaya thatch-growing fields and the settlements of local farmers. Here is a chance to reflect on the relationship between nature and humans in the past and today, and what it might be from now on.

Along with the exhibits, here we introduce the fine points of the skills and lore accumulated by craftspeople in the practical use of materials and tools through photographs and videos.

Every twenty years, the Ise Jingu Shrine sanctuaries are rebuilt in a ceremony known as shikinen sengū. Fields of grass (kayachi) used for renewing the thatch on the shrine roofs covering about 100 hectares extend over the hills in Kawaguchi, Mie prefecture. A video introduces these kaya fields and the way they are being maintained.