Ink shop

While visiting Nara we quickly visited a nice small ink shop. (Nara is famour area for its deers running around freely but about that I'll make a post later) This ink shop has been in the same family for four generations and they had some pretty exclusive stuff :)

The golden ink contains real gold as you can see from the price tags (168,000 yen is about 1680€). It must be exciting feeling to paint with gold :) But more about Nara and Tokio later on...

Stuff for school

Sketchbook for visual studies of japanese details like bamboo fences...

...patterns, "heraldic" symbols...

...stone pavings, turtle shell patterns...

... and so on.

Space perspectives with markers.

Illustraiting old projects.

and trying to learn how to use the markers...I'm sure one day they'll be better..

Small projects for "design methodology" class like this "create something new by using someting that is already done" bowl.

For the workshop I'm making tatami stool.

quick model for the stool.

This is what I have concretely done so far but I'm also planning my bigger project every week with my professor.  I'll show something about that when it is in that state :)

Pancake party

Today we ate some pancakes at school and I played with my new filter for my camera :)

Camp!

This weekend we (me and some of my classmates) joined a camp held by the product design lab. We rented a very nice house with a tennis court for one night. The place was 2 minutes walk by the Biwa lake which is the biggest in Japan. On saturday we played some tennis, walked by the lake and had some great food!

Nabe is cooked and eaten at the same time.

Many different ingredients are boiled in different soups/sauces.

It was actually really really good :)

And the product design professor brought some sashimi, salmon, squid and one dark fish with japanese name :) Also very very good.

On Sunday morning we played some more tennis and went again to the lake. Our breakfast was rice with raw eggs and some soy sauce. It was a new experience since I have never eaten raw eggs before :)

After leaving the house we went to see a place where they grow apples and different fruits you can pick and buy by yourself. For me it really had that kind of European feeling like in France or Italy.

Nice farming feeling.

Trees.

Sheeps wondering under the trees.

On our way back to school we stopped once more by this super cool shrine with a big torii inside the lake. There was a motorway between the shrine and lake so you can see the torii also from your car but we stopped to look around.

Great looking patina. My eyes are always drown to these rustic surfaces with paint peeling off.

Some stamps and stickers.

Scary shrine with long tunnel inside.

Roof tiles in the forest.

Great looking wood and text I yet cannot understand.

And there it is, the stunning torii standing alone framing a piece of the mountain view.

Us three and after some time there came some other people to see it too :)

On our way back to Kyoto.

On our way back to Kyoto.

Beautiful sunset at the mountains.

Great weekend with great people and new friends. Now I must run to bed before the school week starts again. Oyasumi!

Sightseeing

Last Sunday we discovered some of Kyotos most famous places. With Shiho and Tao we took our bikes and started our trip by going to see Daitokuji temple (well actually Tao overslept and joined us at the next stop :)). In Daitokuji it was not allowed to take photos inside the 600-years-old house and garden but the place is my number one at the moment! The stone garden, nightingale floors and painted fusumas felt so special with the old age. It was one of the first buildings to have the white paper sliding doors in Japan! The area is covered with many many temples but this time we only did this most famous one.

At the gate to the temple.

Shiho was the great tour guide :)

Women wearing the traditional clothes at the temple area.

Daitokuji area.

The next stop was the Kinkakuji temple. Here Tao joined us. The golden pavillion looked so beautiful against the green nature behind it. There is something beautiful and harsh in the bilding at the same time. The colour is so strong and dominant but on the other hand it is real gold :)

Golden pavillion.

Beautiful "islands" in front of the pavillion.

From the upper level the building blends so beautifully into the trees that are slowly turning into their autumn colours.

Islands.

Shiho and the pavillion. The first floor is wood and white but the two upper levels all all covered with gold.

Me :)

Beautiful structures at the temple area.

After Kinkakuji we went to have lunch to a restaurant near by. This was my first time to try soba noodles in Kyoto. Everything here tastes so good!

Enjoying the food :)

Classical inteiors.

After lunch we headed to our last stop to Ryoanji temple. The place is famous for its stone garden. This is one of the places that would be so interesting to see in different seasons and to see how the atmosphere of the garden changes.

Map of the area.

Great nature.

The maple leaves are so tiny here! And I love all the different ponds with the sound of flowing water.

Beautiful bamboo fences.

View to the large space with classical Japanese sliding doors and tatamis.

The stone garden.

The stone garden.

The stone garden.

The stone garden.

The most beautiful fountain which also is in my new blog banner.

There are so much to see here! I'm going crazy trying to see everything as fast as possible and same time manage with all the schoolwork :) But luckily I still have a lot of time!