Joji Cranes

It's been quite a while since I visited one of my favourite boutiques tucked away in a small arcade, I have little motivation to leave the house these days but as soon as I do get some I'll be heading on over to get myself some lovely quirky jewellery that's relatively cheap too! They have on say some of these lovely paper Crane necklaces hanging on silver chains from Joji.

These lovely cranes are handmade with love and care by Joji in Melbourne using (Yuzen) paper, the miniature cranes are neatly folded and tucked with precision that would put a plastic surgeon to shame, using traditional Japanese techniques, the cranes are then dipped in resin and strung along Sterling silver chains. They are available in two sizes, shorter chains for smaller cranes and the big beasties are on longer necklaces.

The crane is 7cm (2.75 Inches) from wing tip to wing tip, this makes the broach approximately 3.5cm (1.37 Inches) high and 3.5cm wide (perfect for a statement on your lapel or favourite shirt).

Each of these lovely cranes is unique and individual with the effect of patterned paper being different for each due to the folding and the pieces used, the process of preserving each of these Joji origami pieces is also unexpected, they prefer to cover their pieces in resin rather than lacquer. Lacquer is also used to secure the brooch pins on the backs of their crane brooches as seen on their Etsy store here. Unlike lacquer, resin is very durable and can be worn without fear of wear and tear ruining them and the coating can thwart off sweat, they can even be worn regularly by children though it is not advised to wear it in the shower, lake, pool or ocean. While they are sealed with resin, there is the possibility of it still seeping through.

 

The names Chiyogami and Yuzen are now used interchangeably to describe beautiful traditional Japanese papers. Yuzen papers originate from the Kyoto textile industry and have elaborate gold details in their patterns while the Chiyogami papers (translated to mean 'thousand generations paper') originate in the Edo period of Japanese history (1603-1868) and are wood-block printed papers. Each piece of paper is made from kozo and sulphate and has a silk-screened base layer with the pattern hand-printed above in multiple layers. Each colour visible on the paper is a separate layer of printing and drying which makes these beautiful papers very labour intensive.

Origami

I find it a little unfair and cosmically cruel that while I admire Japanese culture for their geisha and silk kimonos, their neat little tea houses, their martial arts and iconic Harajuku style two of their greatest traditions seem to begrudge me. I absolutely cannot fold things properly, so origami while being pretty and a nice little skill to pick-up is seemingly impossible for me and I cannot stomach sushi. It has been said that unrequited love is the only perfect love there is- but honestly it's taunting more than anything to admire a culture for its aesthetics but when put into practice it seems to cruelly mock me or make my dry wretch in my mouth.

While I am a little sore about origami being seemingly impossible for me, I still admire it and the art of folding and create something simply by arrangement and pulling out neat folded tucks. It always looks so perfect when executed by someone else but when I attempt it there's always tears and paper cuts. Maybe I would be more suited to admiring the art of folded paper that is origami from afar and make painterly impressions in watercolour of iconic cranes- a symbol of good luck.

In a role-playing exercise I was a part of a third world country family and had to try to work in a 'factory' and make origami elephants. Despite being demonstrated the technique, without instructions on paper I go nowhere near the target goal and was probably one of the contributing fact towards several of my family members 'dying'. This little fact is just another reason why origami doesn't ever work out for me when I try. The only things I have made successfully were a box and small matching lid with the help of someone sitting next to me in the fifth grade and I only ended up throwing them out yesterday since they were covered in dust. I hate the feel of dusty paper, dusty books is even worse.

It would be great if I could make a variety of things, I would settle for making paper cranes in all sorts of colours and sizes just like this cute little photograph- but the paper arts will not be easily tamed by these clumsy hands. Above my bed there is a paper crane I found in a classroom before maths was meant to start and beside that are several small plastic dinosaurs from my childhood. It was the best I could do.

I'd love to be able to thread cranes like this in a beaded curtain arrangement- I can only imagine all the work and meticulous folding and detail gone into each of these colourful cranes. The worst thing would be if the paper got moldy or in my case if they got covered in dust. If only there were some way to preserve paper origami properly and prevent the material from perishing... I wonder...