I recently remembered that an old friend from design school had once worked with urushi, so I decided to get back in touch. It turned out that he had since become a wood artist after developing an allergic reaction to urushi. However, he had maintained his connections with people working in the field, and thanks to him, I had the opportunity to visit Okukuji in Ibaraki Prefecture and experience lacquer tapping firsthand.

On a previous visit to Yakuno in Kyoto Prefecture, I had learned about planting and cultivating lacquer trees, but the tapping season had already ended. This time, I finally had the chance to see how urushi is actually harvested and even try tapping the trees myself.

Eight-Year-Old Lacquer Trees

Our guide was Mr. Oka, the representative of Hikobayu LLC.

We visited a grove of lacquer trees that had been planted eight years earlier. Normally, lacquer trees are grown for around 10 to 15 years before they are tapped. Here, however, they were experimenting with harvesting lacquer from trees that were only eight years old.

Although the trees had grown somewhat slowly, they were large enough to attempt tapping. We watched as small cuts were made in the bark and the milky lacquer sap began to emerge.

Climate Change and Lacquer Tapping

Lacquer tapping is generally carried out early in the morning, before temperatures rise, until around 10 a.m., and again in the cooler hours of the late afternoon.

The reason is simple: when it gets too hot, the lacquer sap becomes more difficult to extract.

According to Mr. Oka, about 15 years ago, the sap would become difficult to harvest once temperatures rose above 28°C. These days, however, summer temperatures can already exceed 30°C by eight in the morning.

What I found particularly interesting was his observation that the trees themselves seem to be changing. Nowadays, sap can still flow at around 30°C, although it becomes extremely difficult to extract when temperatures reach approximately 35°C.

Have the trees gradually adapted to the heat, or are other factors involved? It is difficult to say, but this observation, coming from someone who has spent years working closely with lacquer trees, stayed with me.

The tapping season has also begun to shift. Traditionally, harvesting starts around the end of May, but some people have started tapping earlier in response to increasingly hot summers.

Mr. Oka, however, prefers to follow the natural rhythm of the trees. He usually begins tapping about a week after the lacquer trees have reached full bloom.

I really liked this approach: rather than relying solely on dates in a calendar, he looks to the trees themselves for signs that the season has begun.

The Work of Growing Lacquer Trees

Mr. Oka taps approximately 40 to 50 trees a day.

In recent years, the number of people learning and practising lacquer tapping has gradually increased. However, there is still a shortage of people who can plant, manage, and cultivate lacquer trees over the many years they need to mature.

Even if more people learn how to harvest lacquer, production cannot increase without enough mature trees to tap.

Lacquer trees also cannot thrive just anywhere. They prefer well-drained slopes, while places where water tends to accumulate, or land that has been artificially filled with soil, may not provide suitable growing conditions.

The roots extend around 40 to 50 cm into the ground, so it is important to examine the soil beneath the surface before planting.

Choosing the right land and caring for trees over many years is a considerable undertaking. Behind the act of harvesting lacquer lies another kind of work, one that begins long before the first drop of sap is collected.

Many lacquer tappers also have other occupations, often working in lacquer coating or related crafts outside the harvesting season.

Mr. Oka explained that establishing his work as a company had brought certain structural challenges within the lacquer industry into clearer focus. At the same time, he hopes that the company can become a point of contact and an information hub, connecting people and creating opportunities for newcomers to become involved.

I came away feeling that sustaining the tradition of urushi requires more than passing down techniques. It also means creating an environment in which the people involved can continue their work.

After the Lacquer Has Been Harvested

In Japan, a traditional harvesting method known as koroshi-gaki involves felling the lacquer tree after the season's tapping is complete.

But the life of a lacquer tree does not end with the collection of its sap.

Lacquer wood is relatively resistant to water and decay, and historically it was used for stakes and even fishing floats.

In the afternoon, we visited the workshop of wood and lacquer artist Kenji Honma. My friend, who had arranged the visit, had studied under him for three years.

Honma grows his own lacquer trees, harvests the sap, and then uses the wood from the harvested trees to create his works. He carries out every stage of the process himself, from preparing and carving the wood to applying the lacquer finish.

On the way to his workshop, we passed a garden where young lacquer trees were still growing.

Inside, he showed us several works in progress, as well as some raw lacquer he had harvested himself earlier this year.

The raw lacquer was kept in a translucent container. He explained that it had begun to ferment, and we could see that it had separated into distinct layers. As someone who normally works only with refined lacquer, it was fascinating to see how the raw material changes after being collected from the tree.

Honma's work is currently featured in Urushi Now: Contemporary Japanese Lacquer at the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) in London. During my visit in October, he was also holding a solo exhibition titled Atokata (Traces) at hide gallery in Shibuya, Tokyo.

Honma splits open the trunks of lacquer trees after they have been tapped, carefully carving them into thin forms while preserving their natural grain, knots, and irregularities. He then applies lacquer to the interior surfaces, allowing the history of the tree, including the marks left by human hands, to become part of the work itself.

One piece in particular caught my attention.

When Honma split open a lacquer tree that was around 50 years old, he discovered scars left by someone who had tapped the tree some 30 years earlier. At his workshop, he showed us the roughly carved wood before it had been shaped into its final form. Over the decades, the tree had continued to grow, gradually covering the old wounds with new layers of wood.

Marks made by someone's hands to harvest lacquer decades ago had reappeared from within the tree. Rather than removing these traces, Honma embraces them as part of the tree's history and brings them into his work.

I was so intrigued that, after returning to Tokyo the following day, I went to hide gallery to see the finished piece. The delicately carved interior, with its lacquered surface and refined form, had a certain tension to it. At the same time, the scars left by human hands decades earlier remained visible. Somehow, these very different elements seemed to exist together in a curious balance.

I found it incredibly beautiful. (and I really wanted it…!)

In kintsugi, we use urushi to repair broken or damaged ceramics, often leaving the traces of repair visible. In Honma's work, the lacquer tree itself has spent decades growing over its wounds, preserving the traces within. The act of healing a wound, the decision to preserve its traces, and the passage of time that connects them.

What began with a simple message to an old friend became a journey to Okukuji, where I discovered the many years of growth and the work of many hands behind the material I use every day.