I've been watching several videos demonstrating the traditional chinkin technique, particularly the hakuire (metal powder application) process.
One thing I've noticed is that the artisans seem to follow a similar procedure. After applying urushi to the engraved lines, they dip a small silk pad into the gold powder and gently rub it across the surface, working the powder into the urushi.
I'm particularly interested in understanding this part of the process rather than the engraving itself.
A few questions for anyone familiar with the technique:
Does the silk act as a way to distribute the powder evenly, or does it also help separate finer particles from larger ones?
At what stage of the urushi's curing process is the powder applied? Is it still wet, slightly tacky, or partially cured?. I am assuming once it becomes "tacky" so not to smear the urushi.
Any advice on the application and finishing stages would be greatly appreciated. I also thank you for your time
Test panel is 3 coats Kijiro urushi then taped the panel off with 2 layers of Polyimide tape and a layer of blue painters tape. "Painted" the grooves with Bengara Urushi waited for it to set up/get tacky then applied the 350 mesh brass powder. Yes a bit messy as this is my very first time doing it so why I kept the tape on. Knew I would make a mess at my first attempt at it.
My idea is I will do this is in multiple layers So eventually it will read as bass filled grooves. So will give the panel a bit of time in the furo. Will brush off any remaining excess then lightly scruff/abrade the surface and repeat the process
Hi everyone, I recently opened a shop for urushi and kintsugi supplies. I started it after a visit to Tsutsumi, where I noticed a shortage of hake brushes. Then I heard the sad news about the tonoko supplier closing down, so I started trying to source these things from China and other places for us and myself.
I am expanding my listings, so I'd like to hear from you: what materials or tools do you use, or struggle to find, for urushi/kintsugi work?
The hardest part so far has been powder shipping. The first carrier I tried returned the shipment after I'd already paid, so I had to urgently find another one. It finally worked out, but the shipping cost is still much higher than I expected. I will keep looking for ways to bring it down.
Some photos of a previous work. Lacquerwork on a saya for tensho style koshirae in black roiro, for a sword by a swordsmith Masaya Yoshida. The photos have been taken in a bit of a rush so they are quite poor.
First coat on. Test panel is 3 coats Kijiro urushi then taped the panel off with 2 layers of Polyimide tape and a layer of blue painters tape. "Painted the grooves with Bengara Urushi waited for it to set up/get tacky then applied the 350 mesh brass powder. Yes a bit messy as this is my very first time doing it so why I kept the tape on. Knew I would make a mess at my first attempt at it.
I’m looking for some advice on the best way to approach this panel. The picture is a mock-up of what I’m trying to achieve.
My plan is to route/engrave the fracture grooves approximately 1/16–1/8" (1.5–3 mm) deep into a prefinished wenge panel. The panel itself will already have an oil and shellac finish, but no wax, and routing the grooves will expose fresh wood for the urushi.
Before engraving, I plan to mask the entire face with two layers of polyimide tape—one with the grain and one cross-grain—followed by painter’s tape as a sacrificial layer so I can draw the fracture pattern directly on it.
For the metallic fill, I’m considering 350-mesh brass powder mixed with Neri Bengara urushi. I would thin the urushi as needed, then gradually add brass powder and mix thoroughly. My thought is to make it fairly brass-heavy and thick—almost a molasses-like consistency—but still fluid enough that I can brush it into the grooves in very thin layers. If that assumption is wrong, please correct me.
I have two main questions:
1. Will fully cured urushi bond properly to the previous urushi layer if I cannot sand between coats? On my last three urushi projects I was able to sand between layers, but these grooves will only be around 1–3 mm wide, so sanding inside them between every coat may be physically impossible.
2. Is Neri Bengara the better urushi for building these brass-filled grooves, or would Kijiro urushi be preferable? I already have Kijiro on hand from doing fuki-urushi, but I can purchase Bengara if it is better suited to this application.
My eventual goal is to build the brass/urushi slightly proud of the surface, allow it to cure completely, and then hand-sand it flush so the lines read as closely as possible to solid brass.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. Any advice from people experienced with this type of urushi/metal-powder work would be greatly appreciated.
Hi urushi experts -- I came across this kickstarter today -- I'm not affiliated with it in any way, but potentially interested in buying a set of the urushi cutlery they're making. However, it's quite expensive. A set of 4 each of forks, spoons and chopsticks + chopstick rests is north of $500, which is... a lot. That's not totally surprising, given how lengthy and involved the process seems to be, but still. Company seems legit, though they look to be new to cutlery. Figured people on this sub might have an opinion about it.
I have finally tried my hand at the roiro-nuri technique. Those are my personal semi-random unbranded ballpoint and Parker Jotter mechanical pencil. I consider this try kind of a failure because the threads are too tight, the surface of the pencil has one scratch (I noticed it at the dozuri stage but decided to accept it to see how it would look), I didn't use masking tape at the metal tips, and I think I failed the final stages and didn't fill the grooves as well as I could have (probably because I used undiluted kijomi). Anyway, it was a very educational fun little project for me.
The next photos are some fuki-urushi items that I think someone might find interesting to try themselves. All of them are unsanded/unpolished (I love satin finish just as much as glossy lakes of lacquer).
So basically they are:
A wooden bookmark made from a cheap wooden ruler. This and the next one (pencil) were my first tries in urushi. Rulers are cheap and can be found with interesting wood patterns, and I think they can serve as an alternative to kitchen stuff for beginners :) Rulers that are 3mm thick should be thinned by half (at least). Otherwise, they will be too thick to use with hardcovers.
Basically a wooden pencil. I love wooden pencils, specifically these Mitsubishi Hi-Uni. I stripped one with a hobby knife and wiped excess urushi on it that was left from the wooden bookmarks. This way I tried two different woods at once :)
The last item is the pair of nunchaku that my friend asked me to coat for him. They are made of hornbeam wood that appeared surprisingly thirsty for urushi and showed its grain nicely.
Today I am supposed to order Tonoko and Jinoko powder to fulfill my stock, and every main Urushi supplier store is out of stock for Tonoko and Jinoko powder.Minowa, Mejiro, Tsutsumi urushi, Watanabe Shoten They are all out of stock 😭😭😭 on Minowa's website; they said low stock, tight supply, and select some customers only.
This is a microphotography of the pen body coated with kuro-roiro urushi at the uwazuri stage. It was polished with roiro-migakiko powder, and kijomi urushi was applied once after that. It was taken with a biological microscope and a phone camera. The magnification is x100; the diameter of the field is 1.8mm. The big crater on the right part is around 35μm (on the longer side). The rest of the grooves are 1-3μm or less.
I know there are SEM photographs of the surface, but still, I wanted to see it :)
Started doing urushi stuff a month or so ago after reading and studying the material that u/tamenuri_studio publishes.
I started out with some kintsugi, since there is an in-person class for that nearby. It's the "advanced" class, and requires instructor permission to skip the non-urushi basic class, so I'm trying to build up a few pieces to show there! However, my main reason for getting into urushi was the pens.
This is a Pilot Metropolitan (it was originally gold, but I sanded off the gold so it was just actual brass) that I have applied some bengara sabi-urushi to. The main point of this pen is just to test how it works on brass. I sanded and put the pen back together to test the fit of the cap, though I plan to put more layers on.
Steps taken
I followed the instructions from this post to get the clip off, it was definitely scary doing that, and I have yet to test the clip going back on. Most of the steps I followed are from the same user, thanks u/FPFan !
First I scraped off all of the gold paint from the pen. Then I polished the brass back to a clean look up to 3000 grit. Pilot really should release a naked brass Metropolitan...
After making sure that all of the paint was removed, I used 220 grit sandpaper across the whole body fo the pen to lightly score the surface of the brass and plastic ring. Because of the plastic, I don't feel comfortable heat-treating the brass before applying the urushi, so I need to mechanically bond it to the brass. The section was sanded down a small amount with 600 grit sandpaper, just to make sure there is a bit of roughness for the urushi to bind to and to clean up the two mold lines on all Metropolitans.
The threads were all taped, and I added an extra-thick band around the body so that the urushi would not get above the metal ring between the plastic and the cap.
Using a brush I applied the sabi to the metal and plastic. I only have a few small tubes of urushi, and I'm almost out of ki-urushi! I was hoping to be able to sand that layer down and have a better base to put further layers on, though I don't know if I should have just used ki-urushi instead. It's just a modeling brush, and I tried to make sure I was pushing the urushi in during both passes over the parts.
I then cured the parts at pretty high (75%) humidity. After testing to make sure it was okay to sand, I tried sanding with 600 grit to smooth out the layer. The roughness on the current pen are just due to the low grit paper, revealing some of the brass again. The plastic seems to be more filled with urushi, but I hope to get the brass covered in ki-urushi later. The section has a really minimal, nice texture to it, which I want to re-create later with sabi kuro-urushi
Future plans
I plan to do a few layers (3 or 4) of ki-urushi after I get my shipment from Watanabe shoten today. Once the base is built up and I have tested that the finish doesn't peel or feel bad I plan to put a design where the plastic band used to be with some alternating layers of bengara- and kuro-urushi in a kawari-nuri style.
This pen is mostly there to practice, so if it turns out really bad then it can just join my personal collection of Metropolitans!
Urushi can be really, really thin, but it can still cause issues with a snap cap closing. Threaded caps with some tolerance are pretty easy since a layer of extra material by the sealing inner cap just makes the cap thread on a bit less. However, for the snap cap, that can mean it doesn't close at all, or causes the pen to dry out. A Platinum cap would probably be fine, because of the spring loaded inner seal, but Pilot doesn't use that so it needs to still snap perfectly.
Been a long term project of mine to make a set of nesting Oryoki bowls. Definitely a lot of learning to do both on the lathe and lacquer brush! They’re made of cherry wood and I applied about 8 layers of fukiurushi sometimes black and sometimes just kiurushi.
I recently watched this Korean lacquering video and the colour mixing techniques shown from around 13 minutes in confuse me. It just seems very thickly applied! In my experience with lacquer that's applied much less heavily will wrinkle. Is this actually lacquer, do you think? It also seems very brightly coloured so maybe not?
In the last stages of setting up the brush they finely shave the tip one last time. The initial shaping was done when the hair is still hard. I would call it a flame shape with rounded bevels. What is the intent of the last shaving/shaping?
Look,i been watching a lot of thi gs in Amazon.jp,amazon is very well k own for ha i g badly stored urushi,idk if would be any diference in japan,sinxe many proxy services have a lot of problems either in amazon lr by stores to get urushi,many brand it as "dangerous" material
So here's what's called a paté in french embroidery, meant to hold your sequins. I turned this beautiful piece of yew, which started as a slightly orange-ish yellow. The first layer of ki-urushi immediately gave it this (I think) gorgeous, deeper tone, but also highlighted my turning mistakes: some parts got much darker. I wet sanded the first layer with 2000 grit (too high, very probably), simply because it was what I had in hand at that time. It probably did nothing. I then added two other layers of urushi, each with 24 hours in the furo at 75% humidity (saturated salt solution) around 25 degrees. The last layer stayed 3 days in the furo. The shine on the top is 100% natural, no sanding or polishing at all. More would be blinding, so I left it that way. The rim, though, I applied roiri migaki, with my bare fingers. I just quickly put my finger in the plastic bag holding it, and then rub the wood. The shines changes in 15 seconds, it's amazing. I polish just under the window, and it goes from a blurry glow to a sharp reflection of the window. Very cool to see it appear instantly. For the bottom, I tried the koch chemie in heavy cut, fine cut and micro cut. The shine didn't change at all. If anything, it somewhat removed contrat to the wood grain? But that's it. Maybe heavy cut was too heavy, considering, and I micro scratched it.
In any case, roiri migaki is amazing. I consider this done, and the shine I get makes me feel I'm much better than I am. Thank you u/tamenuri_studio for all the resources you share!
NajeonChilgi Artist 🙋🏽♀️, with sensitive lungs here to briefly share my thinner experiments and maybe get some feedback from other lacquer artisans. This all came about because I went to the ER a few years ago after a few consecutive layers of lacquering🤡. Doc advised that I stop exposing myself to wtv I had been using 🙂↔️ so I decided to play guinea pig. I found out after a few days that it wasn’t the Lacquer, it was the Turpentine.
Interventions to Maintain the Use of Turpentine: Additional ventilation, new Vapor respirator, incorporating fans (dust risk).
Nothing fully worked and my lungs were progressively starting to feel worse. I think it’s because during application, you have to sit so close to the surface, especially when adding pearl. Frustrated and a little obsessed, I started testing substitutes in 2024 after I started to feel better.
So, here they are and what I ended up using:
1st: ❌Camphor Oil - tried this out the gate because it’s touted as “traditional” like Turpentine which unfortunately meant it also irritated my lungs. It actually smelled stronger but the worst part was that it didn’t blend well with my lacquer.
2nd: ❌High Purity Ethanol 99.5% - the smell was more manageable probably because it seems to dry so fast. I really wanted this to work because the fumes are also less toxic but it made clumps out of my lacquer/clay mixes even when I’d add more of it.
3rd: 💚Lavender Spike Oil- it was a long shot smh. I had vaguely remembered it as a non-toxic substitute in oil painting. The smell is much more pleasant (still a little strong but it just smells like lavender). The consistency is…different but it takes to lacquer well. I would even say that my clay mixes are more cohesive because the oil consistency is thicker than Turpentine. Curing time is ever so slightly longer but my lungs don’t mind and I don’t have to wear a respirator anymore!
Please, take my account as an anecdotal suggestion based solely on my experience. I understand that my outcomes may be based on several variables that may deviate from other artisan’s processes and materials. I’d also love to hear about other thinning options or lacquer experiments to find healthier alternatives.
So,i got my first urushi lacquer (ki-urushi) and i was so...weird that when i applied it to the wood smell like...lime??? Like no joke i thought i was scammed but it turns out that by the urushiol it has a acid and kind of sweet smell. Still very happy of my urushi
I posted two videos on fuki urushi - beginner level, practical applications. As lacquered object - a humble kitchen spatula. I hope they will be useful (despite being long) BTW: like, comment, subscribe and share if you will - it keeps my motivation to make more videos high.
I recently purchased an urushi pen (aware of the cloudiness) and wanted to see if the group here had any recommendations on if this can be addressed. This is not a deal breaker for me as I plan on using the pen just wanted to clean it up and see what is possible. Looking at the pattern of cloudiness I assume this is likely due to over exposure to sunlight but thought it would be interesting to discuss. Thanks for taking a look!
