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I overlooked mentioning something in yesterday's post about the flooded home of one of my collectors.

I linked to a YouTube video of the damage, and that slideshow has a piano music soundtrack. One of yesterday's readers asked about it, and in the process of looking up the answer, I discovered that the pianist is Ushiro-san's son, and that he has a YouTube channel.

If you enjoyed the music yesterday, please have a listen!

Katsushi-san can handle English, so if you like what you hear, please consider dropping him a comment on his page there ...

I spent the day in Tokyo yesterday on Mokuhankan business (partially), and can report some progress on the new knife set.

First was a stop at one of the shops selling/making paulownia boxes. Given that this new project involves so many things that all have to be up and running before we can get the product on the market, Sato-san and I thought that it might be a sensible idea to use a ready-made box, if we can find a place to supply them at a reasonable quality and price.

The people I spoke to in the box shop took down my description of what I want, and will get back to us next week with a quote. The stuff in their shop looks to be a good quality, and we'll see what kind of price they will give us.

Another option on the table is for me to make the boxes myself, and as I am going to be tooling up next month to make boxes for my upcoming print series, we may indeed end up going that way. We'll see ...

But a more important decision we made yesterday was on the fundamental design of the chisel handles. We met up at the restaurant where the craftsman's association was having a get-together, and during the dinner (we sat next to each other) we snatched bits of 'private' conversation where possible ...

First, let me show you a snapshot of a couple of the chisels in my own toolbox:

These are aisuki, the blunt-nose chisels used for general clearing near the lines. The top one is fairly new (unused yet, actually) and the bottom one has been with me since almost the beginning of my printmaking, being purchased in Tokyo in (I think) early 1981.

For those of you who have no experience with these, this next photo shows how they 'work' - the brass sleeve comes off, and the handles (which are a single piece of wood split in two) open to reveal the blade in its slot. The theory is that the blade can be replaced once it is worn out (from becoming just too short through repeated sharpening).

Now that's a nice theory, but in real life, these chisels wear down so slowly, that replacing the blade becomes a purely theoretical matter. The blade in that lower chisel is still the original one. (Note that this is not true for the main carving knife - I replace that one in the space of months ...)

So given that the blade really doesn't need easy/quick access, professional carvers here do not use handles with the brass sleeve. Here's another of my chisels, with the sleeve tossed away many years ago, and cord being used to keep the thing together. (You can see the shape where the handle was cut to receive the sleeve ...)