Ikebana: Difference between revisions

In an interesting twist of fate, the supervising professor for that final art school project was a childhood friend of Kyozaburo (Sab) Tsuge's wife. A couple of years after she finished art school she was contacted by this professor because of the similarity in underlying idea between her final project and pipe making: both in wood and both highly tactile as well as visual. It didn't go anywhere for a little while, but when Kikuchi received an order for a number of her small wooden sculptures and needed access to a workshop to make them, she reached out to Tsuge and he offered her use of the Tsuge workshop in Asakusa after hours. And from there, she fell in love with the process of pipe making. It was as if she'd always wanted to make pipes, but waiting to discover that handmade pipes existed. It was the perfect fit for the sort of work she had always wanted to do.

Having completed the project for her client, she asked Tsuge if she could stay and learn to make pipes. Fukuda, primary carver for the Ikebana line for four decades, is in his seventies and while he's in great health and still remarkably productive, Sab Tsuge and others have been looking for someone to learn, supplement Fukuda's work, and, in time, guide the Ikebana line into the future. Sab Tsuge cautioned her that it wouldn't be easy, and then gladly welcomed her aboard.