Futagami Brass Household Goods

Metal working and metal objects are quite hard to come by these days, I’ve not found much that has really grabbed my attention over the past year or so. The problem with these metal items is that it’s hard to make something that’s got real character and depth to it, usually it’s either a silver functional piece that you can’t really connect to, or it’s something totally sculptural and quite flamboyant. These seen here on the other hand meet both criteria, ultimately you could see them resting on the table or a shelf, or they could be used to solve a problem and an issue that you come across in daily life. Take for example the above pieces, a set of bottle openers that could also be used as just standard homeware type objects. That’s why I really love the Carl Auböck paperweights that we have in the shop, they look great aesthetically, plus they’re really works of art and could function around the workplace and home.

These particular pieces are made by Futagami, which is located in Toyama, Takaoka City and is one of the oldest brass casting companies in Japan. Masanori Oji joined a workshop at Futagami to learn more about the process of casting brass, he then had the idea to design a brass bottle opener like the ones in the photo above. Upon completion of the workshop Masanori proposed that he would design a line of living wares for Futagami, and this is what you see before your eyes today. To be fair Masanori is quite the genius, this isn’t the only set of beautiful objects that he’s designed, he’s also worked on different wooden items which are right up there with some of the best in my opinion.

As you can imagine these products will only get better with age, brass tends to change colour over the course of many years due to oxidisation. So the longer they’re used, the richer and subtler they become. I’ve seen these pieces in quite a few shops lately, two of my favourites have to be Mjolk in Canada and Mr Kitly in Australia, both places should have to covered in terms of selection. For anything else the Futigami website linked below will help you out.

www.futagami-imono.co.jp

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