A New Year's Silence

On January 1, 2024, a powerful earthquake tore through Japan's Noto Peninsula. No corner of the country felt the weight of that moment more than Wajima City — the self-described Urushi Capital of the World. For over a thousand years, Wajima has been the cradle of Japan's most celebrated lacquer art. Families like Taya Shikkiten have practiced the craft for more than ten consecutive generations, passing down secrets of the lacquer alongside the very walls they worked within.

In a single morning, many of those walls came down.

Walking Through Wajima

In June 2025, we made the journey to Wajima. It was bittersweet from the first step. The beauty of the place — the heritage alive in every storefront, every workshop, every aging signboard — was impossible to ignore. But so was the grief written into the landscape: roads cracked open like old wounds, buildings leaning at angles that defied gravity, the personal belongings of displaced families still visible through broken windows and split walls.

The city's Director of Tourism told us something that stayed with us: before the earthquake, Wajima was never crowded, but it was vibrantly alive — multiple generations moving through the city together, drawn by the craft, by the culture, by pride of place. After January 1, 2024, more than a third of the population left. Most have not returned.

The Hands That Stayed

We sat with Master Yamanoshita, one of Wajima's most acclaimed Urushi Raden artisans — a craftsman known for his breathtaking mother-of-pearl inlay work. He described the earthquake in measured words that carried enormous weight. He had been mid-pen when the shaking began. His cabinets toppled. His worktables were destroyed. The pen he was crafting — gone.

At the main building of Taya Shikkiten, the walls had caved inward. Priceless heirlooms — pieces that had survived wars, floods, and the passage of ten generations — were lost in seconds. Over a year later, Takahiro Taya has erected temporary structures so that the artisans can continue their work. The goal is not merely to survive. It is to make Wajima worth returning to.

The Pen That Started a Revival

Wancher has collaborated with Taya Shikkiten for many years. Our True Urushi collection was born from that partnership — handcrafted by master lacquer artisans whose families have honed the technique for centuries. When the earthquake struck, we knew we had to respond in the only way we know how: through craft.

Within months of the disaster, we worked with the artisans of Taya Shikkiten to create the Wajima Urushi Collection. It sold out within 48 hours — not merely because of its beauty, but because people around the world wanted to do something. They wanted to reach across the distance and say: we see you, we care, and we're buying what you make so you can keep making it.

Why Urushi demands its homeland

Urushi lacquerwork is exquisitely sensitive. Humidity, temperature, even the quality of the air affects whether a piece cures perfectly or is ruined after days of labor. This sensitivity was magnified tenfold by the earthquake. And yet, when we asked Takahiro why he didn't simply relocate the practice to a more stable city, his answer was four words.

"Because then it wouldn't be Wajima Urushi."

That sentence holds the entire story. Urushi is not just a technique. It is a place. It is the mineral-rich lacquer that comes from the trees of this specific peninsula, worked by hands that have never known another home. To move it would be to end it. So they stay. And they create. And slowly, deliberately, they rebuild.

The Irreplaceable Origin

It may seem, on the surface, as though one could practice Urushi anywhere on earth — given the right tools, the right materials, the right instruction. But Urushi is not merely a technique to be transported. It is an art form inseparable from the place that shaped it. Much like a Rolex or a Patek Philippe must be crafted in Switzerland to carry its full meaning and authenticity, the truest Wajima Urushi can only exist when it is made in Wajima — without exception, without compromise.

The earth, the climate, the water, the generational memory embedded in the workshops and the hands that work within them — these are not incidental. They are the art itself. Wajima Urushi is not a brand. It is a birthplace.

Why Every Pen Matters

This visit deepened something in us. It is easy, from a distance, to appreciate a beautiful object — to admire the depth of a lacquered surface, the shimmer of Raden inlay, the weight of something made entirely by hand. But standing in Wajima, walking those cracked streets, hearing Master Yamanoshita speak about the morning his studio was destroyed — appreciation becomes something more personal. More responsible.

It may feel sentimental to say this, but when we announce the launch of a True Urushi fountain pen, our aim is never simply to make a sale. We want as many people as possible to see the pen — and through it, to discover Urushi. To understand what it is, where it comes from, and what it takes to create it. Because every person who comes to appreciate Urushi, who is moved enough to write with one, to gift one, to simply learn about it — that person quietly, unknowingly, helps the people of Wajima endure.

A pen is a small thing. But a thousand people holding one, writing with one, asking questions about where it came from — that is not small at all.