Japanese tradition is not short of beauty. What it is short of is editing — a way of presenting itself that someone outside Japan can walk straight into, without a guide.
That is the work we set out to do. Take something with centuries behind it, strip away everything that is only decoration, and set it down so plainly that it needs no explaining. matchaism is that done once, with matcha: single-origin, from Yame in Fukuoka, nothing added.
Preserving a tradition and continuing one are not the same thing. For a craft to still be practised in a hundred years, it has to make sense now, and it has to make a living now. That is the test we hold every project to.
We are based in Tokyo, which is where the editing, the design and the brand work happen. The rest of it is out in the country — the well-known regions and the valleys most visitors never reach — sitting with the people who grow, fire, weave and mill. We build businesses around traditional craft, around farming, and around the places themselves, because demand is what keeps a craft alive. Nostalgia is not a business model.
matchaism is our own brand. That means the farms, the stone mills and the standards are ours to open up — and ours to hand to someone else, under their own name and in their own colour.
matchaismYatatabi Inc. · Tokyo