TL;DR
Get pool and patio gear delivered free with Prime
- Fast, free delivery on millions of items
- Prime Video, Amazon Music and more included
- Member-only deals all year
A Livingetc report explains kogei as Japanese everyday objects shaped by local materials, inherited knowledge and human judgment, rather than by hand production alone. It also points to a steep decline in employment in Japan’s traditional craft industries, raising concerns about the regional networks that keep these practices going.
Livingetc has published an explainer on kogei, a Japanese approach to making useful objects that links them to regional materials, inherited techniques and makers’ judgment. The report, drawing on the account of Nakagawa executive vice president Tasuku Ogino, also highlights a decline in employment in Japan’s traditional craft industries, from 288,000 people in 1979 to 48,334 in 2022.
Kogei is often translated as Japanese craft, but Ogino describes it more specifically as tools for everyday life, shaped by local conditions and knowledge accumulated across generations. The report distinguishes it both from art made principally for appreciation and from industrial production focused on uniformity and efficiency. In this account, usefulness and continued adaptation are central to the category.
Hand production is not the defining test. The Livingetc report gives Nakagawa’s Hana Fukin kitchen cloth as an example: it is woven on machines, but its production relies on operators adjusting for humidity and differences between looms. Its material history is also local. The cloth adapts kaya, a breathable fabric associated with Nara’s former mosquito-net industry, for kitchen use.
Kogei can also depend on many specialists rather than one celebrated maker. A ceramic object, for instance, may involve separate workers handling clay, glaze, molds and firing. The report says those interconnected skills are vulnerable when a link in the production chain disappears. Nakagawa, founded in Nara in 1716, says it works with more than 800 workshops across Japan.
The People Behind Everyday Objects
The report’s focus shifts attention from an object’s appearance or price to the regional knowledge and working relationships behind it. A bowl, cloth or kettle may carry skills that are distributed across a community of makers; preserving the object’s production can mean sustaining more than one artisan or workshop.
The employment figures cited by Livingetc indicate the scale of the pressure: the reported workforce in traditional craft industries fell from 288,000 in 1979 to 48,334 in 2022. Those numbers do not, by themselves, explain why employment declined or show the status of every craft. They do underline why the survival of specialist skills and production networks is a concern for the people involved.
For readers interested in interiors, kogei offers a way to notice the design of familiar objects without treating them only as display pieces. Its value, as presented in the report, lies in objects that are made to be used and continue to respond to changing daily life.
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
A Tradition Rooted in Place
Livingetc frames kogei as a category distinct within Japanese ideas of art and making. The report says the Japanese language has separate terms for art, craft and everyday craft, placing kogei in the last of those practical traditions. Japan’s criteria for traditional crafts begin with everyday use, according to the article.
The report states that 244 crafts appear on the government’s traditional crafts list, with at least one represented in each of Japan’s 47 prefectures. It describes each tradition as tied to a region and a chain of contributors, rather than necessarily to a single artist’s signature or an object’s rarity.
Ogino’s comments reflect Nakagawa’s perspective as a company selling Japanese craft goods and working with workshops. The article also includes the perspective of London-based designer Yoko Kloeden, whose studio combines Japanese aesthetics with contemporary interiors. These sources illuminate how kogei is understood and presented; they are not a survey of all makers or consumers in Japan.
“What matters is whether the object is rooted in its local environment and in accumulated wisdom about daily life.”
— Tasuku Ogino, as quoted by Livingetc
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
What the Workforce Figures Show
The article reports employment totals for 1979 and 2022, but does not provide a breakdown by craft, region, occupation or cause of the decline. It is not clear from the figures alone how many practitioners remain active today, which skills are most at risk, or how employment has changed since 2022.
The report also does not establish how many machine-assisted products would qualify as kogei across different makers or traditions. Its examples and definition come chiefly from Nakagawa and the people interviewed by Livingetc, so the account should not be read as a formal census of contemporary practice.
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
Keeping Regional Skills in Practice
Livingetc does not announce a new program, funding decision or policy response. The next developments to watch are whether workshops can retain and train specialists, whether local production networks remain viable, and how makers adapt traditional knowledge to current uses and markets.
For now, the report presents continued everyday use as part of what keeps kogei relevant, alongside the people and regional systems that produce the objects. It offers no timetable for changes in industry employment or a forecast for the crafts discussed.
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
Key Questions
What does kogei mean?
Kogei refers to useful objects shaped by local materials, inherited techniques and knowledge of everyday life. In the Livingetc report, it is described as a form of everyday craft rather than art made mainly for display.
Does kogei have to be handmade?
No. The report says hand production alone does not determine whether an object is kogei. Machine-woven goods may fit the idea when human judgment, local knowledge and inherited methods remain part of production.
Why can kogei involve several makers?
Some objects rely on a chain of specialists, each responsible for a stage such as preparing clay, applying glaze or firing pottery. The report says losing one specialist can affect the wider regional production network.
How did employment in traditional craft industries change?
Livingetc cites a decline from 288,000 workers in 1979 to 48,334 in 2022. The article does not provide a detailed breakdown or explain the causes of that change.
Source: rss
Halloween Picks
halloween
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
