Craftsmen of gold leaves in Kanazawa

Gold has fascinated human beings as a beautiful precious metal that never loses its luster. Meanwhile gold is produced in comparatively small quantities. These antithetic characteristics may have given birth to gold leaves. A gold leaf corresponds to gold metal in quality, on the contrary, the gold leaf doesn’t correspond to gold metal in texture.

A gold leaf is an indispensable item in Japanese culture. Golden Buddhist statues, golden fusuma ( Japanese sliding screens), golden houses and golden armors( it’s funny). These golden surfaces are made by gold leaves.

Kanazawa and Gold leaves

Nowadays 99% of gold leaves are produced in Kanazawa which is my home-town. By the way, the name of Kanazawa in Japanese is “a golden marsh”. In that kind of meaning, Kanazawa deserves to be the supreme producing city of gold leaves. Moreover, citizens in Kanazawa are the most numerous ice cream eaters in Japan. In such Kanazawa you can gain amazing experience of eating a soft ice cream covered with a gold leaf at many sightseeing spots. Besides, you can enjoy seeing craftsmen performance of producing gold leaves or making your own work by gold leaves in Kanazawa.

The characteristics of a golden leaf

The first characteristic of a gold leaf is that, it is very very thin. It is approximately one ten-thousandth of a millimeter. You can break it only by your finger with a little pushing. And if you see through a gold leaf You can sense light through the gold leaf. The second one is that a gold leaf becomes familiar with the surface of many other objects. Thus gold leaves can exhibit these luster on the surface of pottery, glass, wood, paper and strings moreover on the surface of human beings.

I visited the Yasue Gold Leaf museum in Kanazawa. It shows the production process of gold leaves. It has seventeen steps work from gold metal to gold leaves, moreover every work requires a high skill by the hands the craftsmen. Thus the production process is classified into three craftsmen groups. The first group is of the fundamental craftsmen who produce rough gold foil from gold nuggets and a few silver and bronze metals. The second group is of the finishing craftsmen from rough gold foil. The third group is of the Japanese paper craftsmen because golden leaves need velvety Japanese paper in order to expand gold foil smoothly. A craftsman beats sheets of gold foil and paper wrapped with leather repeatedly. Once the gold foil of a work task are expanded to the desired size, the craftsman draws them out from the paper, and put them into the more velvety paper of the next work task. Likewise, this work is repeated time and time again, finally gold leaves are produced. Then the Japanese paper is indispensable for producing gold leaves.

Every craftsman in the three groups needs to keep attempting to lift his skill up to try to produce a better craft by self-control and endurance.

The history of gold leaves in Kanazawa

The museum says the history of gold leaves in Kanazawa. The history of the production of gold leaves in Kanazawa involves twists and turns.

Firstly, Toshiie Maeda who was the founder of the Kaga Clan ordered the production of gold leaves to his citizens before the start of the Tokugawa Bakufu in the latter past of the 16th century. However Tokugawa Bakufu prohibited the production of gold leaves excepting the places where the Bakufu permitted the production of gold leaves, Tokyo and Kyoto. Then craftsmen of gold leaves in Kanazawa and the Kaga Clan had been producing them in secrecy.

After the end of the Tokugawa Bakufu craftsmen of gold leaves in Kanazawa became to be able to produce them freely and openly. Mysteriously speaking, the production of gold leaves in Tokyo and Kyoto vanished at the same time.

The museum said that the reason was for the premium quality of Kanazawa gold leaves, it was probably true but I think there was another reason from my feeling according to the characteristics of citizens in Kanazawa. The citizens in Kanazawa, as far as I know, are gentle and they don’t assert eagerly their good points to other people. Besides, they don’t have a desire to conquer several other markets even though they have some marketing knowledge or some economic strategy in order to beat other producing cities. Thus it is unlikely that the growth of Kanazawa gold leaves replaced Tokyo and Kyoto actively.

On the other hand, my idea of the other reason is that craftsmen in Tokyo and Kyoto relinquished their jobs in the process of producing gold leaves by their own hands. From the end of the Edo period to the early Meiji period many societies in Japan changed significantly. Figuratively speaking, the production of gold leaves is similar to the form of a comb. We can’t use a comb with gaps and throw it away. As with a comb with gaps the production of gold leaves which lacks some craftsmen in part of the process isn’t able to function properly and vanishes over time.

To the next historical stage 

Aging problems on the gold leaf craftsmen is serious. If nobody continues the gold leaves work, the link of the gold leaves works would be a comb with gaps eventually and gold leaves in Kanazawa would end up vanishing. In this condition Noriyuki Matsumura, who is a young craftsman succeeding his father’s job of the production of gold leaves, said as follows;

“I am proud of my job when I imagine that gold leaves made by my hands are useful to shrines and temples. Nowadays private houses are set with Buddhism praying facilities (“Butu-dan”; an altar manufactured by black lacquer and gold leaves for praying to Buddha) become fewer, but I am afraid that it is not a good tendency. If the Japanese lose the place where their hearts depend on, they would lose their own good characteristics of being Japanese. I want to contribute myself to part of the Japanese spirits.” He is a promoting wonderful craftsman in a subdued celebrity culture in Japan and the latter part of his talk is the same as what I have come to think recently.

Travelers, even foreigners, can aid him indirectly through eating a soft ice cream with a gold leaf.