"Since ancient times, wood has been contemplated with reverence in Japan. Even after being cut, it’s been seen as a living being. Shinto, the country’s original religion, viewed trees as divine, a means by which the gods descended to earth. Later, Buddhism taught that the Buddha attained enlightenment outdoors, beneath a tree.”--Corinne Kennedy
https://www.seattlejapanesegarden.org/blog/2017/6/14/the-magic-of-trees-architecture-and-woodworking-in-japan
George Nakashima's home: "One of the most iconic designers and craftsmen of the 20th century, George Nakashima (1905 - 1990) left a significant mark on modern design. In fact, the Japanese-American woodworker’s influence can be seen everywhere today. (The popular live-edge tables? That’s him.)
His hallmark was reusing parts of trees, sometimes leaving whole logs virtually intact. His belief was that when you made furniture, you created a new life for a tree." --by GOODEE (on Instagram). This Nakashima article contributed by Patricia Vining.
The last time we were in Tokyo Patricia and I took our friend Jim Reed to Isetan, our primier Tokyo department store where we saw a large "live edge” table top made extra beautiful by the "butterfly" inserts. It was a perfect example of Wabi sabi. See the video:
Patricia Vining and Jim Reed talk about Shabui and wabi sabi in Shinjuku Tokyo.
We found that table so appealing that when we returned home, Patricia was able to commission Brian Benham, a craftsman to make our "living edge” floating butsudan.
You can find Brian at... https://www.benhamdesignconcepts.com/
The beauty, as in wasabi comes from the imperfections that bring us closer to nature. George Nakashima learned about wabi sabi from Gentauro Hikogawa while they were imprisoned at Minidoka in Idaho during World War II. Let's find out how Brian Benham learned about "live edge”and “butterflies" along the arc of his journey. Stay tuned.
Floating “living edge” butsudon commissioned by Patricia Vining.
"The object created can live forever,” Nakashima wrote in his 1981 autobiography, The Soul of a Tree. “The tree lives on in its new form. The object cannot follow a transitory ‘style’, here for a moment, discarded the next. Its appeal must be universal.”
Butterfly wedge photos by: Toby Manzanares
photo credit: Toby Manzanares
Most people from the west would see a "cracked or flawed" slab of wood, but the Japanese have a word for this type of beauty: wabi sabi. the imperfections that bring out the nature in all things. --tnm
Originally, Nakashima did it out of economic necessity as this meant he could use the cheaper cuts of wood available at lumberyards that nobody wanted. That resourcefulness — a result of the time he spent in an Idaho internment camp with his wife and newborn daughter during World War II — laid the groundwork for a prolific practice in New Hope, Pennsylvania, where he built a workshop and home in 1947. [The site was officially designated a National Historic Landmark in 2014.] Working first with scrap wood and then with offcuts, Nakashima developed a style that embraced nature’s imperfections.What was unprecedented when he started out — incorporating the natural edge of burled, knotted, or salvaged wood in a design — is now trending along with other eco-friendly furnishings. "The respect for the natural form of wood is very Japanese," his daughter Mira Nakashima explained. "Dad said that he thought he was a Japanese Druid. Druids worshipped the trees. But the Japanese Shinto tradition is very similar — that very deep respect for the things of nature and the forms of nature. Dad thought it was in his blood."Today, following in her father’s footsteps as a woodworker, Mira runs the Nakashima studio and lives with her husband in a house that her father built on the family’s plot of land, surrounded by his creations. “Dad thought wood had a story to tell, even when it has been made into a table, it speaks to you.” credit: GOODEE on Instagram.
