Kyoto cardigan

It's a funny time to be writing about this one as it's very much a warm weather cardigan, and even though I had it mostly finished way back when the weather was still warm, I was unhappy with it and kind of threw it in the naughty corner. So by the time I pulled it out and did the last touches - adding the button and loop, and crocheting an edge on the collar to make it a little longer - it was really too cold to wear it. (These photos were taken the same day as those of my magnificent warm coat.)

The story of this cardigan starts way back in this post about our time in Kyoto last June. Scroll down to the latter part of the post to read about our rushed visit to Avril, where the possibilities are almost endless as they blend the yarn for you on the spot; but it took us a while to work that out, due to us not speaking Japanese!



I bought this as a kit - now that I think about it, probably my first ever kit. The pattern was only written in one size, which is apparently not uncommon in Japan. So it was lucky that the sample garment fit me quite well, though I planned to make it about 10cm shorter.

It was also written in Japanese. I am so grateful to my friend's lovely mum, who is also our former neighbour from childhood, who was happy to translate the pattern for me. Once I had the basic instructions it wasn't hard to understand the Japanese schematic method of presenting the pattern. There is a lot less written out than in a typical English-language pattern.

I was pretty sure that I achieved the right gauge, and yet my cardigan is smaller on me than the sample one was. It is wearable, but it also annoys me that the fronts hang much lower than the back. I usually blame that sort of thing on my particular proportions and posture compared to the designer - some patterns you have to tweak for your own body of course - but in this case I tried on the sample and it was fine!

Placing the button quite high helped with this a bit, and I was glad I decided to just do a loop for the button after finishing, rather than gambling on where to put the buttonhole. Honestly I'm still not sure whether I'll find this wearable. I think it looks better in the photos than in real life. But I still hope that it might stretch and grow a bit with wear, because in this case I think that would actually be an improvement.

Tokyo Oxygen

I have a new coat for winter. A new, unique, hand made for me coat.



I feel so incredibly blessed because my mum gave me an IOU for my 40th birthday (last year), and she is an amazing artist, designer and artisan of exacting standards.



We decided to hunt for fabric on our Japan trip in June last year. It was early summer, and the first few fabric shops we tried had few or no winter fabrics in stock. Finally we hit the jackpot on one of the last days in Tokyo, when we went to Nippori Fabric Town, a neighbourhood specialising in fabric and haberdashery. So many fabric shops.



Even there we really only found the right kind of wool in one place. Luckily it was this fabulous charcoal, and a small amount of the black and white textured wool for contrast. In another shop we found a lovely piece of green leather.



Mum used up almost every scrap of that leather with the piping around the collar and down the fronts, edging the sleeves, and along the shaped seams on the back flowing around the pockets; and all the other greenery she added. (Above, you can see the piping around the pocket, and the fancy pocket lining which shows just in little flashes as I wear it).



The lining fabric Mum found in Melbourne and it is perfect. She always likes to use interesting prints instead of plain linings. This stuff is 'shot' so that from one angle it looks green (sadly, I did not capture this in a photo) and the other purple.

The coat was based on a pattern Mum had used before for her own winter coat, but she drafted the assymmetrical collar from scratch with some suggestions from me, and taking inspiration from a different asymmetrical coat I had seen in a catalogue.





One of the first things that struck us about Tokyo was the amount of greenery everywhere, as well as the incredible tidiness in such a big city. Mum took that idea as her inspiration and hence the name, Tokyo Oxygen. The green 'fingers' have a double meaning for us, representing the green growth and parks we loved in Tokyo, and also a stylised city skyline.


Here are two great details. There are two subtle zippered pockets inside the lining, perfect for a passport or bus pass. And the gorgeous buttons came from a collection my aunt bought in Nantes, France, as a souvenir for Mum. I really liked them so much better than anything else we could find, but they were a little too small. I hit the jackpot at the Camelot stall at the Old Bus Depot Markets, finding some slightly bigger plain ones in the same dark silver colour, which fit exactly behind the smaller gold and silver ones. I love mixed metals.



It is so warm, and completely unique and I am absolutely loving wearing it.

Oh and I happen to have almost matching green boots - hand-me-downs from little sister many years ago.

The last day in Japan

Our flight home was delayed - actually Jetstar cancelled it, probably because it was underbooked, and put us on a Qantas flight about 12 hours later instead. So this last Tokyo day was a bonus day out in the city.



We decided to explore Ueno, in the Taito district of Tokyo.



In Ueno Park we spent some time wandering around Shinobazu Pond. Yes, the photo above is actually of a pond.



My sister stopped to watch a magic show. This was just at the start; he quickly drew in a much bigger crowd. Just along from here there was also a group of artists painting and sketching the pond.



There are lots of turtles in the pond! We spent ages watching them hanging out on their comfy logs.



Then we visited the nearby small, excellent Shitamachi Museum. An English speaking guide showed us around. One of the things I remember the guide talking about was religion in Japan and how many people adopt or practice to some extent both Shinto and Buddhist beliefs (or at least ceremonies and rituals for different occasions). The museum preserves a little bit of old Tokyo tenement life and you can walk into the various shops and rooms. Upstairs there was a more typical exhibition space as well.






We had a grill-your-own kind of lunch in this casual restaurant with awesome squid art painted on the wall. Then it was time to head back to the hotel to get ready to leave for the airport.

Island of art

When we were planning our two weeks in Japan, one thing we all agreed on right away was that we had to visit Naoshima. An island, with modern art all over the place? Considering we all love MONA, and the Sydney Biennale a few years ago, this sounded like it had to be a win.

No apologies - this post is going to have a lot of photos. And that's without really any photography inside any of the museums and other buildings.



We arrived by ferry from Uno into the main port, Miyanoura, and then took a taxi to the village of Honmura where we were to stay for two nights. As this was one stop on our small tour through selected parts of Japan (Tokyo-Kyoto-Hiroshima-Naoshima-Tokyo), naturally we had all our luggage with us. My suitcase is quite small really but I still felt self-conscious, as other visitors and tourists arriving on the ferry seemed to have small weekend packs only. I probably pay too much attention to these things.



Once we had found our B&B style accomodation (friendly people and basic facilities - a nice big room for us to share, and even a washing machine and hanging space outside! My jeans finally got a wash) and settled in, it was time to find dinner. So no serious art-hunting that day.

There are a number of art galleries on the island and with only one full day to really look around, we made it through just a couple of them. There are also a lot of outdoor works/sculptures - from charming more modest things like this string art found throughout Honmura, to massive pieces by international artists like 'Frog and Cat' by Karel Appel - pictured at the top of this post.



This kind of juxtaposition is not at all unique to the island. Vending machine next to shrine, vending machine next to absolutely anything actually.



There were little cute touches like this around Honmura. Not sure if this bin is functional, but cute so who cares!





We started out in the morning by exploring Honmura, hunting for each of the houses in the Art House Project. Of course we also stopped for essential morning coffee in one of the tiny unexpected cafes found halfway down a small street.



The Art House project involves artists converting empty houses into works of art (and spaces for works of art). Most of them are old houses that have been unoccupied for a long time, as the island gradually lost a lot of its population. 'Minamidera' - no photo, sorry - was custom built to house a James Turrell work. Turrell is one of several major artists that have a close relationship with Naoshima and some other art islands nearby. Though I liked a lot of the Turrell works I saw in the recent Retrospective at the National Gallery and I love the skyspace 'Within Without' permanently installed there, this one didn't really do it for me. You line up and then shuffle into a pitch dark space, waiting several minutes for your eyes to adjust and for a faint light form to appear. I may have been feeling impatient that day? Maybe it was too subtle and meditative for me....



This one I really liked. 'Haisha' is the former residence and office of a dentist, converted and decorated thoroughly inside and out by Shinro Ohtake. Can't remember for sure but I think photos weren't allowed inside.



Which is a shame, because there is a two-story statue of liberty in there.



Not part of the Art House project - just a private semi-hidden garden. After seeing at least one charming enough house with a 'no photography' sign, presumably a resident who'd had enough of gawking tourists, I felt slightly sneaky taking this shot even though there was no sign here expressly forbidding me.



Naoshima is quite small and all of it is quite accessible on foot. There are also bikes for hire all over the place. After we explored Honmura and the Art House Project for the morning, my sister took herself off for a bike ride and Mum and I took a short bus ride towards the Bennesse House Museum. The large, sprawling site around the museum has several sculptures and installations.



'Frog and Cat', Karel Appel



Pumpkin by Yayoi Kusama



I don't have the name of the artist who made this double-planter sculpture, but standing in front is my lovely mum.



Selfie stick



Honmura drain cover to add to my modest collection.

The Bennesse House Museum was fantastic - a pleasant building to be in and move through, and an impressive collection of modern art.

In the evening we all wanted to visit another Shinro Ohtake work, the communal bathhouse, 'I Love Yu' a pun based on the Japanese character used here for 'yu'). This deep into our stay in Japan, we had had a couple of bathing experiences with various elements of awkwardness and thought by now we knew what we were doing. However. The people working here didn't exactly make it easy. First we got there and learned that even though there was a person at the counter, you had to buy an entry ticket using a vending machine. The person on the desk kindly told us this, though he seemed to think our floundering around was pretty funny. It would have been nice if he had also mentioned that you had to bring your own towel. Other bathhouses we had used - including one very large commercial one in Tokyo and one at the ryokan in Kyoto - provided towels. It wasn't until we were all in the bath that we realised there weren't any towels. We had to draw straws to see who would be the one to get dry and dressed, go back out to the entrance and buy three very small souvenir towels.

So that was a bit weird, given that it was clearly a tourist attraction, part of the art trail and not just a traditional bath house that would be mostly patronised by locals. I guess there might be a bit of tension in some quarters between locals and the 'art world' that has descended on their island. There seemed to be gentle laugh being had at our expense.

In any case the bathhouse is small but pretty spectacular (worth clicking to have a look - I didn't get any good photos outside and obviously you don't take photos inside). The men's and women's sides are separated by a wall with an elephant on top. On certain days the sides are switched so that everyone gets a chance to view the elephant from the other side.



Miyanoura Harbour was beautiful in the evening light, and also quite lovely the next day when we returned for our ferry back to the mainland.

It was absolutely worth visiting Naoshima, we had a great time. If it went back I would try to time it for the Setouchi Triennale - maybe in 2019?

Hiroshima

Going to Hiroshima was my idea; I was drawn to it as the site of a fascinating, momentous (if horrific) historical event. I don't regret it at all, but going through the Peace Memorial Museum - the grim building below - was a pretty harrowing experience. Probably not helped by the fact that part of the museum was closed for renovation, and so visitors start their tour/immersion pretty much at the moment of the atomic bomb's detonation, with this model of the city with a massive red ball, representing the bomb exploding, suspended over it.



From there the galleries do a very good job of immersing you in the horror of the bombing and the aftermath. One theme that stayed with me was the seemingly endless stories of young teenagers who died, accompanied by displays of shredded school uniforms and other personal items. Many of these kids would not normally have been in the city but they had been mobilised for war service and put to work tearing down and clearing buildings to create fire lanes.



I'm sure I came across the story of Sadako and the paper cranes quite young. In the years after she died of leukemia, Sadako's classmates raised money to build a memorial to her and other children who had died as a result of the atomic bombing.



Sadako's story became so well known and such a popular symbol of peace that people from all over the world started bringing or sending paper cranes to the Hiroshima memorial, and they still do. Display cases around the memorial showcase the latest collections, either in long strings or arranged into colourful pictures.



Eventually as the paper fades and ages, the cranes are recycled to make new paper. In the museum gift shop I bought postcards and writing paper made from recycled paper cranes.

A moderate walk beyond the children's memorial, we  came to the A-Bomb Dome (Hiroshima Peace Memorial). This was the only building so close to the hypocenter of the blast which was left standing, and the city decided to keep it in its shattered state as a memorial.



Near the dome, a couple of bomb survivors had tables set up, where they were talking to people and I think selling books. Volunteer tour guide Okihiro Terao made these very beautiful glass 'before and after' models of the building, formerly the Products Exhibition Hall.



I came away from Hiroshima wanting to know more about the context of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the time. I knew only the basic facts and the idea that the bombings had been considered to have ended the war, but I wanted to know especially how the decision was seen in the US at the time and after, and what people knew about the bombs, their destructive power and the radiation effects. In the past couple of weeks I've been reading 'Hiroshima in America' which covers some of this ground. It does spend a lot of time on the psychology of several important figures in the decision, especially President Truman - interesting stuff, if it does go on a bit (and as many reviews have pointed out, maybe speculates a bit much). The thing is, during the last few days of our trip, in I saw this book in the small English section of a huge secondhand book shop in Tokyo, and I was instantly drawn to it. But it was a large hardcover, I have a small suitcase, and have mostly broken my habit of book-buying while travelling; so I moved on quickly to the basement full of second hand clothing instead. Once I got home I couldn't stop thinking about that book. I had moved myself on so quickly I hadn't even written down the details, but I managed to figure it out and soon an old library copy was on its way to me via Better World Books.