Japanese design studio Nendo has created a range of chopsticks in collaboration with manufacturer Hashikura Matsukan, who continues to make chopsticks using traditional techniques that have been used in the town of Obama for over four centuries. Since the seventeenth century, the town’s lacquered chopsticks have been recognised as the hardest and most beautiful of Japanese chopsticks.
Nendo explored ways of increasing the surface area of the chopsticks in the hand, as a way of improving comfort and discovered the natural form of a flower, or the digital symbol of the asterisk. Another chopstick has been carved away to form fine points, so that they float above the tabletop for cleanliness, while another has in-built magnets to keep the chopsticks together.
All the items will be sold at Seibu department stores in Japan exclusively from spring 2014.
Photos by Akihiro Yoshida
