Tina Koyama’s culture means a great deal to her. It is why she has made it her life’s work to revitalize traditional Japanese craft by establishing POJ Studio in Japan and the United States, specifically in California. As part of her brand’s mission, POJ Studio is launching its fall series of kintsugi workshops at Sonia Boyajian’s Studio in Los Angeles, adding to its ongoing workshops at the Japanese American Cultural & Community Center (JACCC) in Little Tokyo and Intertrend in Long Beach.
It was Koyama’s mother who first exposed her to traditional crafts and kintsugi, the practice of repairing broken ceramics with lacquer and gold, making the cracks part of the object rather than hiding them.
“When I founded POJ Studio, I didn’t yet know what I wanted to sell,” said Koyama, who is based in Kyoto. “Then kintsugi came back to me. I kept seeing it in U.S. design media, where it was trending, yet there was very little education about what it truly was, how it connected to the traditional craft industry or the fact that the urushi lacquer industry, built on a natural material made from tree sap, was in steep decline.” . . .
Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.
