white Kozu paper (made from mulberry fibres), one side silk screened by hand, reverse side is raw, white border
This paper “for eternal generations” (“chi” means thousand, “yo” means generation(s), “gami” means paper) has a rich tradition and, with its brilliant colours, was originally used as a material to make small paper objects like puppets or boxes. Each individual sheet of machine-made white Kozu paper is printed by means of an elaborate screen printing process which is done by hand with the result that a typical white border is left free. We carry only a small selection chosen from among the myriad possible patterns that themselves are based on Japanese kimono materials. Some of the more than 1,000 traditional patterns go all the way back to the 17th century. There are two distinct groups: the Edo type (Edo is today’s Tokyo) with striped, chequered or cherry blossom-like patterns which come in one colour with only slight variations and the Kyoto type with many different motifs in many coloured resplendence.