Mr. Fukuraro Hayafune (早船福太郎) is the bamboo craftwork master with over 60 years of his career. Bamboo craftwork is started in Kyoto for designing Japanese garden. In the Edo period, bamboo craftwork is not only for Japanese garden, but also used to create various daily used items such as baskets, hats, cargo, man-taxi, and so on.
Currently, most of his works is designing Japanese garden especially "kakine," the bamboo wall. He will produce any over 100 kinds of Kakine to fit any Japanese gardens and house. With the traditional style of bamboo designing from his father and his infinite motivation of creating new way of art form, bamboo craftwork is spread to the many area.
For example, his bamboo products supports the "Kabuki" stage. Not only the huge stage sets with bamboo, he also creates stage grass. This grass is about 0.3 to .04 mm thickness, and he can also create 0.1 mm thickness. All of those grass are made by his hands. Machine cannot make this thickness. The reason for making grass with bamboo is the sound. If the grass was made by paper, the Kabuki actor said it sounds like paper and he cannot make a good acting with fake sound. However, the bamboo grass has the same sound with the real grass. So, his work is supporting the great acting of "Kabuki."
As the age of 79, he still do all work from cutting bamboo to finishing.
His policy is doing the best for his clients. When he sees the happy face of his clients, he said he will be also happy. However, he is also typical Japanese craftman. When his clients are not happy he gets mad and start fighting. This is the Japanese craftsman's spirits. He has great proud of his work.
Whatever you have any request with bamboo work, he will create great bamboo works for you. His blades are also same as his career. He has been using the same blade for over 60 years and it never be broken. Those Japanese traditional items and the hands technique are still way behind the machine works.