The Quiet Joy of Living Simply

Yoshii Town, located in the southeastern part of Fukuoka Prefecture, prospered as a post town on the Bungo Road, and still retains a charming atmosphere with its rows of merchant houses featuring white-walled,蔵造り (kura-zukuri) architecture. After taking the highway from Fukuoka City and exiting around Asakura or Haki, you enter a pastoral landscape.

The impression one receives from an object varies from person to person. Even with objects, what we perceive differs depending on whether we view them from a functional perspective or from an aesthetic and emotional one. Like people, objects possess a function and, before being useful tools for someone, they hold an irreplaceable, distinct presence.



Shigatsu no Sakana is a shop dealing in antique objects. The building housing the shop was once a private residence, a dental clinic built in the 1950s. Its appearance is filled with a sense of quietude and freshness. The owner, Mr. Seki, has preserved the building's deeply textured character, which was crafted with care, with minimal renovation, and lives there.

The lifestyle of accepting things as they are, and the way the shop operates, are clearly reflected in the atmosphere the shop creates and the objects placed within its space.

The range of the Miminashi Mountains, stretching like the spine of this town. The townscape of Yoshii, still retaining the atmosphere of a post town, is spread out. There are plantings of flowers that bloom beautifully each spring, like a rebirth of the beautiful people who live there, and the gentle care of those who nurture them. On the day of my visit, an exhibition by Hisayo Kurohata was being held. She is a ceramic artist known for her work in Tajimi, Gifu Prefecture, a renowned pottery region, and now has her kiln in Ukiha Town, next to Yoshii Town. Her works have been handled by the shop for some time.

The ceramics Ms. Kurohata creates are Raku ware, known for its beautiful crazing, fired slowly at low temperatures. Her light yet solidly formed pottery conveys a human warmth and subtle grace, reflecting the maker's intentions and thoughtfulness.



This space, where daily necessities and tools that have been used by people for years, passing through many hands, are arranged alongside vessels and objects created with earnestness in the present era, finding their rightful places and resting quietly together, is surely unique and unlike any other.

The quiet joy of living simply, of living as a matter of course. This is a shop that exists alongside people's lives, where such irreplaceable everyday scenes feel cherished and beautiful.