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Staying in a Pottery Town: Shigaraki and Mashiko, a Journey of Clay and the Table
Plenty of travelers buy pottery on their trips. But the pieces usually ride home still wrapped in newspaper, waiting for a free shelf in the cupboard. A trip where you actually stay in the pottery town is different. You spend the day until evening wandering the kilns and pottery shops, and the piece you chose goes straight onto that night’s table.
A piece of pottery seen in a shop and one used at the table are two different things. The weight of it in your hand, the expression the glaze takes on when it holds a bowl of soup, its color in the morning light. When you can give a piece its trial run the very night you bought it, your relationship with it starts out deep. A rental house with a kitchen becomes the laboratory for exactly that.
Shigaraki has become almost too famous for its tanuki figurines, but its true strength lies in the power of its clay. A land capable of firing large pieces produces vessels that are generous and warm. Mashiko, meanwhile, is a town of everyday tableware. Its unpretentious, thick-walled pieces, heirs to the mingei folk-craft movement, were born for the family table. In both towns, kilns and galleries are scattered along the streets, and half a day melts away just walking between them.
A Trial Run at a Villa in the Shigaraki Highlands: THE ROSE VILLAGE
A villa glamping retreat of just 5 buildings, set in the Shigaraki highlands. Each villa bears the name of a flower and its own theme; you can enjoy a sauna, an open-air bath and a pool, and savor a course dinner of seasonal ingredients. Spend the day touring Shigaraki’s kilns, then return to the highland villa at night. Sitting down to dinner while wondering which dish will flatter the piece you bought: that hour, too, is part of the pottery journey.
A Satoyama Hot Spring in Mashiko, Two Groups a Day: Mashikokan Satoyama Resort Glamping
A hot-spring glamping stay limited to 2 groups per day, set in the satoyama countryside of Mashiko, Tochigi. You sleep in a dome tent and choose between a BBQ of Nasunogahara beef and local ingredients or a satoyama kaiseki dinner. There is also a large communal bath and an open-air bath fed by the “Bijin-no-yu (beauty bath)” hot spring, a natural spring containing sodium and calcium. The center of the pottery town is close by, so a day of pottery browsing flows seamlessly into a satoyama night. A plan for staying with your dog is available as well.
On to the Next Pottery Town
Beyond Shigaraki and Mashiko, the pottery towns continue. Hasami with its blues, Arita with its painted porcelain, and in the Kanto region, Kasama. Each town’s clay and glaze have a character of their own, and the more you wander, the sharper the outline of your own table’s taste becomes. The souvenir of a pottery journey is a single plate, but the real souvenir is the memory of the trip that comes back every morning you use it.