Kin’emon Toen & Shigeki Fujishiro
The popular opinion of Arita porcelain’s colour palette might be that it is ‘blue on white’. But when designer Shigeki Fujishiro explored the common styles of Arita porcelain he discovered the predominence of the colour red. Even the application of paint to porcelain in Arita is called ‘aka-e’ (meaning painting red), after the Chinese porcelain of the same name. Red is a symbolic colour of Japan and Fujishiro decided to make it the central feature of his collection.
Fujishiro collaborated with Kin’emon Toen pottery. Together they emphasised the functionality of the objects and created shapes that would be suitable to either eastern or western tables. The red colour comes from a mixture of red pigment and glaze being applied to the objects. After the initial glaze, an additional glaze is applied using an air-brush painting technique that is a speciality of Kin’emon Toen pottery.
