The 7th Generation Yazaemon, Satoru Matsumoto, proudly introduces, "Arita Porcelain Lab" the "NEW" Brand of the "Yazaemon Kiln", which has 200 years of history specializing in the "IMARI" style, known for its lavish gold painted designs.…
[ Address ]1-11-3 Kamikouhira, Arita-cho, Nishimatsuura-gun
Saga, Japan
[ Hours ] 10：00～16：00
[ Holiday Store ] non-regular holiday
[ TEL ] 81-0955-29-8079
[ FAX ] 81-0955-43-2580
HOME > History
Yazaemon Matusmoto was born the second son of Heizaemon Matsumoto, the founder of kiln-fire ceramics in in Kamikohirayama. Upon coming of age and gaining independence, he established Yazaemon Pottery.
At that time, the wares in Arita received a pottery production license from the reigning feudal clan, and carried on business using ascending kilns in both the Uchiyama (12 kilns) and Sotoyama (10) areas. Kamikohirayama is one of the Uchiyama kilns.
The Yazaemon kiln is located between the west end of Kamikohira lane, originally called Kakinokishoji, and Odaru, so this place is called Odaruguchi.
Shozaburo Matsumoto was born the eldest son of the first Yazaemon in 1823. His mother, Oiwa died when he was just four years of age. In 1938, when he was 16, he succeeded to Yazaemon status after the death of his predecessor in 1838. However, the young Yazaemon had to cease operation of the pottery business, due to the depressed economic state the country was in at that time, as a result of a great famine.
After that, he lived a vagabond existence, attempting to keep the property inherited from his parents in his possession, but as he increasingly became caught in the grips of poverty, he was forced to rent out his land, and resorted to gambling any income attained from rent. Finally, he was apprenticed to Naritomi Shichiya in Saga Castle as a live-in servant.
Despite having never known a mother’s love and struggling through most of his adult life, even before the completion of his apprenticeship his fortune changed and he was able to climb his way back up from the lowest of circumstances. He then married Otomo Nishimura, 7 years his junior, but died soon after, ending a life of hardship at the age of 36, and leaving behind his young wife of 29, and newborn baby.
Shonosuke Matsumoto’s mother, Otomo Matsumoto, earned a livelihood through door-to-door peddling of imported goods from China. Even though they had a roof over their heads, his childhood was spent in extreme poverty.
The New Years after turning 15 years old, he assumed the Master's name of the third Yazaemon. With the 3,000yen that his mother had laboriously saved, he started a financial loans business. His father’s death amid extreme poverty, along with his mother’s struggles with financial debt and his own memories of hardship, led him to make this business venture decision.
With his business progressing steadily, Shonosuke turned 17 and married Outa Fukami, eldest daughter of Yonetaro Fukami, a potter in Izumiyama. When he was 21, after the passing of his father in law, Yonetaro, he took over Yonetaro’s west ascending kiln, gradually establishing himself as a distinguished potter.
In 1888, together with like-minded people, he established the finance company Kyoei Corporation, for public benefit and local industrial development. (Over time, Kyoeki Corporation become Kyoeki Bank, and after a merger became the present-day Saga bank) At the time, Arita Bank was the only bank in the area, and was one whose main focus was on serving the ruling potter’s class, thus making it difficult for common people to access and utilize the bank services. Shonosuke therefore realized the need for an indiscriminate bank accessible to all people, which led him to establish Kyoeki Bank, in collaboration with millionaire Hyoemon Kamachi.
Arita bank was therefore known as the ‘King Bank’ and Kyoeki Bank the ‘Straw Sandal Bank’ among people at the time. The consequent rivalry and competition between the two banks also contributed to the development of local industry.
Shonosuke became a town council member in 1889, and then successively entered, and became vice chairman of the Nishimatsuura County Council. Soon after establishing an apprenticeship training school in 1895, he began campaigning for said school to become enlisted as a prefectural industrial high school. In 1903, this school became ‘Arita Industrial High School’, which is still in existence today.
Shonosuke also contributed to the establishment of Nakadaru cargo station and in 1909, to the opening of Kamiarita Station, operated by Kyushu Railway. This dramatically changed the method of distribution of Arita ceramics, and allowed Arita merchants a stronghold in the market previously monopolized by Imari merchants.
Shonosuke passed away in 1931, at the age of 75. Although not a potter, his contributions to promote the Arita area as a whole greatly influenced the growth of the Arita ceramic industry.
Seiji Matsumoto was born in 1876, the second son to his biological father, Gennosuke Watanabe, a sake brewer in Arita. When he entered the second grade of high school in 1892, he was adopted by Shonosuke Matsumoto. After graduating from high school, he started to work at Imari Bank, but in order to achieve his dream of restoring Yazaemon Pottery to greatness and exporting its products overseas, he quit his job at the bank and absconded from home without his family’s permission.
He then borrowed dozens of Arita ceramic samples from his brother-in-law, Giemon Maeda and left Kobe for Bombay in India. After his funds ran out, he arranged travel to Durban in South Africa as a deck passenger, negotiating to make payment on delivery, of both himself and his goods - an arrangement scarcely permitted at the time. He then found work with the sole Japanese-owned commercial laundry in Durban, operated by a Mr. Iwasaki. Using his pottery as collateral to borrow money, he paid back his debt for travel and freight and continued to work at the laundry. He intended to save money for travel to Europe, but after just two and half years in Durban, the Russo-Japanese War broke out and he was summoned back to Japan.
Unable to forget the taste of the Western-style cooking he had eaten in Africa, Seiji taught his wife to cook the likes of curries, stews, soups, steaks, and would invite his friends for dinner and treat them to such Western-style dishes. In those days, the Matsumoto’s Western-style cooking was famous among the people of Arita, and came to be known as “High Collar”.
Seiji could not give up his dream of exporting Arita ceramics, and finally established a ceramic trading company, Arita Bussan Ltd, in 1906. This time his father-in-law, Shonosuke approved of his intended operation and offered financial support. Taking this opportunity, he succeeded to the forth Yazaemon's name.
The Arita Porcelain Company and The Hizen Ceramics Company purchased the majority of materials, and collaborated alongside Matashiro Takasu, famous for Old Imari red painting,
Its signature and trademark was 「有」 – The first Chinese character of the word ‘Arita’ （有田） – written inside a square.
| 1940： | Tetsuo Matsumoto took over Arita Bussan Company, and established Arito Co., Ltd., achieving satisfactory results in domestic wholesale and trade business in the ‘Yen Block’: Korea, Manchuria, China. |
| 1947： | The trade name was changed to Arita Ceramics Co., Ltd., and continued to expand in the export market focusing on countries South of Japan. |
| 1953： | The trade name was changed back to the current name, Arita Bussan Co., Ltd., and shifted their market focus towards export to North America and Europe with the brand name of “Gold Imari”. They won an account in Syria and Morocco and began exporting large amounts of products there. |
| 1957： | The company acquired the manufacturing plant and equipment of their business partner, Arita ceramics Limited, finally fulfilling his long-held dream of becoming an established pottery manufacturer, and thereafter began the reconstruction of the Yazaemon kiln. |
| 1964： | Expanding the business operations to Imari city, the company began to produce pottery for everyday use. From this point on Yazaemon pottery came to produce a wide range of ceramic products, from plates and utensils to decorative dishes, vases and ornaments. |
| 1968： | A move to establish a clay production plant in west Arita allowed the company to improve and maintain the quality of their product. |
Tetsuo was commended for his efforts and achievements in reconstructing Old Imari, nurturing traditional industrial methods and promoting trade within the region. For this, he received an Blue Ribbon Medal in 1970, and 5th Class Gold and Silver Rays in 1977.
After the floating rate system of the Japanese Yen came into effect, the Yen climbed to over 200yen, and the value of exports decreased greatly for the company. Ikuo Matsumoto thus decided to shift the company’s focus to the domestic market, after which, the majority of demand came from wholesale and retail dealers. In 1994, Ikuo moved operations from the aging plant in Sotoyama to a new location in Akasaka.
Ikuo was known to love his liquor, drinking whiskey and water after he got home on weekdays, and from morning to night on his days off, preferring the cheaper Suntory White whiskey to many more expensive whiskey brands. He was of a simple yet sincere character, also seen through his preference of Toyota Corollas, over other more expensive cars.
After graduating from the Kyushu University Department of Economics, Satoru Matsumoto entered work at a city bank. He continued work there for three years, but was then called upon by his family to take over the family business.
After developed a brand of Arita ceramics called the “ARITA PORCELAIN LAB” series, to suit the modern lifestyle of the time, Satoru started a Porcelain Revival project, and using high quality clay of Izumiyama, set out to achieve the same high standard products as the original Arita ceramics.
Satoru Matsumoto was a beast of a man, standing 186cm, 90kg.
About the Matsumotos
The Matsumoto house is a traditional wooden townhouse with 4 rooms, with a gabled roof, an entrance at one of the gable ends, and in the style of ‘Machiya’ - representative of the Meiji Period. There is a shop room with the entrance hall and a closet in the front, central rooms in the middle and a room with Buddist altar, a living room and a reception room in the back. The kitchen juts out adjacent to the dirt floor passage.
The second floor is of equal size to the first floor, with a closet above the central room, connecting to tatami mat spare rooms. The ceiling and floors of the front, middle rooms and passage is cosmetically polished, and with colored pillars, and timber beams and white wall a beautiful contrast of colors is created. The vertical strips of lattice, partition between the front and middle rooms remain reminiscent of the original building. The stairs, which house storage chests, have a width of about 2.7 meters and beautifully decorated banister are located behind a sliding screen door in the central room. On the other hand, the stairs in the first floor have a width of 1.8 meters, no handrail and are thus of a very different style from the second floor stairs.
In addition, a small alcove with a depth of 0.45 meters lies beside the kitchen on the first floor. The alcove in the second floor room has no shelves, is flat, simple and elegant.
The stairs are central to the line of flow of the building, and were built after the Meiji era.
The storage under the steps has drawers and sliding doors, which can be accessed from the center room. The stairs have an element of furniture about them, with their appearance somewhat akin to a large stack of boxes.
Fusuma, the Japanese sliding paper door, is the one construction that brings together the four components of paper, frame joints, metals and lacquer work, and is why there is great competition between craftsmen when undertaking fusuma construction, as it is an opportunity for them to display their skills in each of the four respective categories. In the many wooden structures of Japan, buildings consist mostly of pillars and beams. It is therefore the sliding doors within these spaces that create an atmosphere in the room. This is why handles and small details on such doors play a vital role in exhibiting the crafter’s skill and taste of the owner.
Even in many houses in Arita you can find transom panels above sliding doors, a traditional feature in old-fashioned Japanese houses. These display beautiful and unique designs which vary widely, depending on the intended use of the rooms.
The small path beside the Matsumoto’s house is called “Kakinoki Shoji”, a name attributed to it a long time ago.
When walking the path, you come across “Shojian” on your right, and at the end you will find “Tonbai wall”, made of waste kiln bricks from Tuji Seijisha pottery.
Shojian is the house of Magoemon Ezoe. He was fully responsible for the development of a highly successful dinner set for Nippon Touki Co., Ltd (Noritake).
He was the CEO of NGK Insulators, Ltd. and NGK Spark Plug Co., Ltd. during World War Ⅱ, and become Arita town mayor for two years after the war. However, he decided to return to the position of CEO of TOTO Limited when the management structure of the company had collapsed and was in need for a turnaround.
Tonbai Wall was constructed through layering the fireproof bricks and tiles from the inside of the old ‘Tonbai’ kiln. Tonbai bricks are very unique in color and luster, from their prolonged exposure to intense heat, and the lacquer that comes off the pottery when scorched in the kiln.
About Arita
【The houses and streets in Uchiyama, Arita】
Arita, the first place in Japan to successfully kiln-fire porcelain in Japan, became a lively little urban society in the small valley of Izumiyama - where many porcelain products had previously been discovered.
The porcelain produced here was shipped from Imari and dominated the Japanese market. At one point in history, Arita even overtook Jingdezhen in China, to conquer the world porcelain market.
Arita could therefore lay claim to having been the birthplace of porcelain in Japan, and has since maintained a strong economic base.
In 1828, the town of Arita suffered from a major fire, but overcame this disaster to become the ever-lively city it is today. The town of Arita, made famous the world over for its pottery, boasts wonderful scenery full of traditional houses and streets, of which the town folk are very proud.
