Kesurokai

Backwards = forwards … the story of Gränsfors Bruks

I was rather taken with this little story from the Gränsfors Bruks "Axe Book" (which is available to download in 8 different languages here):

In pre-industrial time all axes were hand forged to styles decided upon by the way they were used, the preferences of the carpenter, and the skills of the smith. Then, with 19^th century industrialisation, came a boom in demand for axes and the means of mass manufacture. Production shifted to factories and designs gradually changed, influenced by streamlining production and lowering costs, often at the expense of the functionality of the tools.

Gränsfors Bruks started making axes in 1902 and moved with the times, competing for the mass market, until in 1989 the skilled craftsman-designer Hans Erik Persson took the bold move of stepping back to the pre-industrial era. He started re-designing their range of axes with a focus on the needs of the craftsmen who were using them and also decided they should have a natural forged finish to show the quality of their manufacture. (Mass-produced tools have their surface imperfections hidden by being polished, filled and the surface painted.)

So, Gränsfors make specialist axes and employ around a dozen smiths, each ‘signing’ the axes they make with a stamp with their initials. Whilst they do use modern machinery (see the video below) there is clearly still considerable skill in the process. The company pride themselves in the quality and durability of their produce; whilst they cost more than their mass-produced rivals, they last so long and work so well that a craftsman would not wish to replace one on a whim.

I must add that I am not just saying this because they have kindly donated tools to our event. Robin and I have been teaching spoon carving courses for several years and have built up a collection of Gränsfors Swedish carving axes for participants to use along with a few Wildlife Hatchets for those who favour something smaller. They have seen long, hard use and are excellent tools!

 

Gränsfors Bruks axes

Gränsfors Bruks are a very small company and do not normally offer sponsorship so we consider ourselves very privileged to have been given some tools by them to send out to Japan. The Japanese really appreciate high quality tools and Gränsfors' are superb; hand-forged and designed by people who use them. In return for their generosity I shall be providing them with photos, and hopefully video too, of the tools being used on the project.

 

We now have most of the tools from our tool list and by the end of next week the large crate will be sealed and they will begin their slow voyage by sea to Japan, hopefully arriving by the time we get there in August. The reason so many tools are needed is because there will be a large number of Japanese carpenters working over a short period of time on the European paviliion. Whilst they could work with their own Japanese axes, part of the point of the project is that everyone gets to experience the tools and techniques of the others' culture.

I will write more about Gränsfors Bruks later because the story of their company is fascinating, but in the mean time here is some video of Robin using one of their Swedish carving axes which were developed in association with the great master spooncarver Wille Sundqvist and are superb for spoon carving.

N.B. there is no audio on this video due to WMG falling out with YouTube

Watching you watching me

I was really pleased to get a message from a French reader of this blog the other day. Paul is a timber framer who also works by hand using traditional tools and techniques and is currently restoring an old French farmhouse. Unfortunately my French is little better than my German so I can't figure out much more than that from his video, but it is highly worth watching because you don't need to understand what he says to see the skill in what he is doing:

Paul Zahnd. Charpentier à l'ancienne

What was special about Paul's message was that I had been aware of his presence for some time. The 'control panel' for this blogging software shows me where the most recent visitors have come from and I had regularly noticed an entry from France reading on 'Google Translate'. I had wondered if it was the same person and now I know it was!

Interestingly, the most common search terms which people have found this blog from are "Japanese tea house" and "Japanese axe" - I wonder why?

Craft learning and "the crit"

"The crit" is central to traditional design education and I sat in on one this week as part of my current research at Sheffield Hallam University. It brought back memories of doing it myself, it is a fairly scary experience, and it made me think about the Japanese craftsmen's apprenticeship experiences described in Edo craftsmen : master artisans of old Tokyo.

Firstly let me describe "the crit" for the uninitiated; it's a little like X Factor or Britain's Got Talent, but the audience are also putting on the show, they are students each showing their latest work. One by one they go to the front of the room and show images of their work on PowerPoint and hand around things they have made. The 'judges' are a group of lecturers who sit around a table making notes, discussing, asking the students questions and offering advice.

It is only three weeks until the students hand in their final projects and they need help knowing what to do to get it finished satisfactorily. Quite a few haven't made good use of the Easter holidays and are going to have a busy few weeks. The atmosphere is a bit tense, the lecturers at times have to be quite blunt to the students about their work, but whilst they are tough, they are also very fair and very supportive. There feels to be a close bond between the lecturers and students. At the end of the session another student drops into the room to give a little box to one of the lecturers; it contains a cup-cake and pinned to the top is a handwritten thank-you note!

Whilst the students go through this many times during their three years at University, the old craftsmen in Toyko had often started at a very young age and continued under the critical eye of their master for many years. For some it was clearly a positive experience, but others spoke with perplexing pride of the fact that their masters never praised their work and they were reluctant to praise their own work themselves. I can't decide if it is false modesty or a genuine feeling that they ll never be as good as their masters. Either way, it doesn't strike me as healthy.

This somehow joins up with my other major project with Open University where I have been part of the team writing a new course in Design Thinking which is entirely delivered online and all the students study it remotely. I am tutoring one of the first batches of students through the course and also moderator on the student forum so party to a wide range of online interactions. In this situation it seems to be quite difficult to "crit" the students and even getting them to do critical analysis of their own work is not easy. This too is not healthy!

I feel that for online / distance learning to be successful there needs to be a way of getting the right sort of "crit" into the arena. It needs to fall into the 'tough but fair' category, which partly comes from the attitude of the teachers (those I observed clearly worked well together as a group), and partly from their relationship with the students. Fostering all this online is very different to dealing with face-to-face relationships and so much of it falls outside the scope of the sorts of learning resources I have been designing, however it is clearly vital to their success. Hmmmm ...

Japanese inspired craft work

I just had Kesurokai orgainser, Hannes Schnelle send me some photos of his work to put on his German web site, but they're so lovely I thought I'd share them here too.

Hannes trained in Japan in the skills of making both shōji, traditional Japanese sliding screen doors, and timber framed buildings. His current work reflects the influence of both cultures, beautifully  demonstrated by this log store, affectionately called by its owners 'the temple for logs.'

 

Here are some more traditional shōji made as cupboard doors:

 

 

Finished model of the pavilion

So, the scale model is now finished and it looks very beautiful. This will now act as a plan to help when the carpenters construct the life-size version in Japan. There are a few lovely little details I noticed:

Stone piers: It is sat on top of little stones and I am guessing this is how it will be constructed because it is the same as our little barn. The bulk of the timber frame will stay dry because of the roof and wall cladding, but the bottom pieces are prone to rot if they are on damp ground. So it is traditional to raise the frame on little stone piers with a small piece of lead between the stone and frame. You can see those for our barn below, left. The stones came from the stream just below Robin's workshop and the lead was donated by our neighbour, the vicar, who had some left overs from last time they repaired the church roof:

 

Oak pegs: The model is held together with wooden pegs because that is what will hold together the final building. Each joint is carefully constructed so when the pegs are knocked through the holes they pull the joint together. The pegs have to be made from really dry wood so they will not shrink afterwards and a large number are needed so I imagine this will be a less-strenuous but slightly tedious task for the carpenters once they are on-site.

Joint numbers: Every joint is labelled with a series of symbols and you can see these too in the picture below of Hannes working on our little barn. If you can read them, the symbols will show exactly where in the barn each end of every timber goes. Buildings like this are not built gradually, instead all the pieces are cut and every joint tried and tested in isolation before finally the frame is constructed in one go. I think there are various different regional systems of doing this in Europe, and the Japanese one is different again, so it will be interesting to find out how they have chosen to do it!

 

There are more pictures of the final model in the photo album.

Tools (and the wonders of Skype)

The carpenters have an extensive tool list that is needed to build the European pavilion and these must be taken with us because many of them are unique to European carpentry. 

This morning Robin and Hannes spent quite some time discussing which tools are still needed via Skype; somehow it is much easier to talk when you can see each other, particularly if one of you is not speaking in your native language. The screen sharing option mean you can look at web sites together too, here they are discussing axes:

The pressure is now on to source them all because, due to their great weight, they must be shipped in advance, leaving at the beginning of May. Hannes has arranged a discounted rate with a shipping company and is building a substantial crate (3m x 1m x 1m) to contain them all.

Many of these tools are very expensive so they are also working on obtaining discounts and sponsorship deals for them. After Kesurokai the tools will remain in Japan as gifts for the Japanese carpenters who will be our hosts.

削ろう会

I have been looking for more information on the internet regarding the main Kesurokai events in Japan and just had a major breakthrough. Firstly the word in Japanese 削ろう会 and then the most frequently-used  translation which spells it with a "z" (American in origin) and often also hyphenated, giving kezuro-kai or sometimes kezurou-kai.

Now Google is providing me with all sorts of interesting things like this:

Profile: Ulrik Hjort Lassen

Ulrik is from Denmark, but currently based in Sweden whilst studying for a PhD in practical carpentry, researching working methods in timber framed constructions. His particular interest is in the different procedures of “Afbinding, Opsnøring and Tilridsning,” Danish words which (unsatisfactory) can be translated into layout and scribing.

The Scandinavians take their traditional crafts much more seriously than in the UK and have an excellent educational programme to show for it. Ulrik started his carpentry training at the Dacapo Craft School in Sweden, which was originally a vocational training centre for carpenters specialising in traditional building crafts, but then became part of Göteborg University. So he now has a Bachelors degree and is currently undertaking a five year research programme for his PhD.

Whilst I admire the Scandinavian’s attitude to traditional craft, it seems that practice-led PhDs are not well established in the field and he is still struggling with “ways of executing practical research in an academic world without losing the performance of the craft”. Having done a practice-led PhD myself and subsequently been doing research training for others, this might something I can help with. I am looking forwards to spending some time with Ulrik in Japan and discussing this.

In the mean time, a large part of Ulrik’s time is spent on practical building projects, both on his own in the building yard, and as a part of different projects, which have been all over Europe since much of the timber construction in Sweden is with whole log construction, rather than timber framing. The Japanese Kesurokai is an opportunity to spread his knowledge a little further!

 Ulrik will travel to Japan with his fiancée, Lina Lo Gillefalk, who is just completing a qualification as a conservation officer specialising in the built heritage (“bebyggelsesantikvarie”). She will be an observer on the project and together they will write about the importance of practical workshops to maintain both practical skills and the intangible cultural heritage of the building crafts.

There's more about Ulrik, including some video, on this fascinating French timber framing web site.

The original Japanese kesurokai

Kesurokai meetings started in Japan in 1995, organised by the highly respected temple carpenter Sugimura san. His aim was to bring together different craftsmen who normally work remotely to exchange traditional craft techniques and knowledge.

These events serve not only the practical purpose of ensuring age-old skills are maintained, but also create a sense of community amongst the craftsmen, helping them maintain their businesses. The Kesurokai movement has around 1500 members in Japan and holds twice yearly meetings all over the country.

A friend just brought this web site to my attention which has some images from a Kesurokai meeting in 2006 which show just how large and well attended they are:

 

 

There are also some really superb videos on the web site showing how various woodworking tools are made.