Tokyo Quilt Show 2012 tour

Here are more details and photos about the Tokyo Quilt Show. If enough people are interested I am going to lead a tour to the 2012 Tokyo show. This would be for people who are nervous about going there on their own but who are fairly independent with a minimum number of 6 and maximum of 8.
The itinerary would be something like this...

Fly into Kyoto
5 days Kyoto with day trips to Kurashiki and Nara
Visit Kinkakuji, Ginkakuji and Kiyomizu temples.
Various textile venues including shibori workshops

2-3 days Nagano or Matsumoto
Visit Matsumoto castle, buy fabric in Matsumoto, visit the snow monkeys near Nagano

6 days Tokyo
2 day visits to Tokyo Quilt show
Visit Asakusa temple, Amuse gallery
Visit an antique dealer who deals in antique fabrics.
Fabric shopping and antique kimono exhibitions (depends what is on)

If you are interested let me know and I can send details. Costs would depend on the number of people.

Here are some more photos of quilts from the quilt show to inspire people. They are all from the framed quilt section. Probably they would be in the miniature quilt section in NZ.

Other things of interest in Tokyo in January are the displays of dolls and temari balls. They are leading up to Girl's Day or  Hina-matsuri on the 3rd of March.

The picture below is from an exhibition in Ginza at Matsuya department store (7th floor) . The maker is Aiko Sakai who is 87 years old and has published several books of her designs. We talked to her daughter who was minding the exhibition, her name is Makiko Tada and she has been to Nelson teaching Kumihimo braiding.

There are also displays of Emperor and Empress dolls in many of the department stores.

Tokyo Quilt Show

I managed to miss a week or so, with no access to the internet or limited access via Ipod touch. So this is a catch up. My kids and I flew back to Tokyo where my elder son went missing for three days while he attended 3 Jazz gigs and went to 7 Jazz bars (despite being under age in Japan). His brother tells me that he came home at midnight and was still in bed when I got up.

I caught up with  Chris Kenna from Wellington and the 'Toerags' from Lower Hutt and we went to Tokyo Quilt Show. I first tried to go on the Saturday but after seeing the  queues to get in, went off with my son to the Hakone area (near Mt Fuji) for the day. I finally got to the quilt show on Monday and it was amazing. Although the Japanese quilters are not so hot in the non-traditional 'art quilt' area and some of the machine quilting was pretty bad, the hand applique and hand quilting sections would blow us out of the water. Here are just a few that caught my eye. I'm doing a talk for Cotton On quilters in Wanganui on saturday so will add more photos as I get myself organised.

Here is a picture of the inside of Tokyo Dome with the booths in the middle and the crowds of people. The main people to watch for are the little older ladies. They are a head shorter than me so about 4ft nothing and their elbows are at kidney height. They have no qualms about bulldozing their way through.

Here is the winning quilt - Twelve Days of Christmas' by Osami Gonohe. Most of the day, you couldn't get closer than 4 metres because of the crowds but I stayed till closing time one night so I could get a shot of it without the crowds.

Above is what it normally looked like.

Above is 2nd place winner which was even more amazing in my opinion. Unbelievable points!It is by Emiko Yoshino

But what about this quilt in the Tradtional quilt category which didn't get a prize? The pieces are smaller than my fingernail (don't worry, I'm not touching it, my finger is about a cm away). I'm sorry, the catalogue name is in Japanese.

I think this is based on Ainu decorative work. The Ainu are a tribe from Hokkaido.

This is made using a lot of antique indigo cottons

I think I like the detail even more

This looked like a prizewinner till you see the one that actually won!

 This quilt is incredible - it is - Scherenschnitte (Chris Kenna told me) - like a papercut.  It didn't win a prize!

Centre of the Scherenschnitte quilt. 

There were also a large number of amazing quilts from famous Japanese quilt makers who were invited to show their prizewinning quilts. The one below is called 'Nostalgia' and is by Tsuneko Shimura.