Thread: August/September 2011 trip to Japan

Yesterday I went to the Feather Company Museum in Seki, Gifu Prefecture. Stepping into this beautifully displayed eleven gallery showplace opened up my eyes to how just how involved one company during the 20th century would have to be in order to stay in the forefront of the razor industry in Japan. Housed in a multi storied modern building the flow of the displays takes you from the ancient implements to remove facial hair like clam shells and obsidian to iron sand tamahagane steel blades and into the modern hollow ground blades most of us use.
Although a Japanese company museum, there are a lot of other makers represented in the folding straight razor section from other countries, but all in all the majority of the folders, disposables, clippers and double edges, advertising and associated ephemera in the central sections of this collection were made by the Feather Company. I was happy to find a couple groups of natural stone razor hones that were accompanied by place cards noting which barber shop this one or that one came from along with the name of the barber. Also you can see in the photos below some specimen stones retained in the collection, larger is always rarer and they have a few slabs so large that they could only be in a museum setting. I will post some photos of the razors in the Razor Section of SRP.
P.S. I also wanted to mention that at San Francisco International I went through a full body scanner and was asked to submit to a secondary test. Evidently the scan detected that my left palm contained a nano particle of some kind. They took a swab and ran it through an analyzer, negative on the nitrates and poisons, positive on the Kyoto toishi dust.

*faints*
I so want to spend a night in there! Just me and my razors (and no water. Damnit!)
Beautiful pictures!

Beautiful pictures. Thank you so very much for a most interesting post. Good job, I almost felt that I was looking over your shoulder...almost!!!

Whoa, that must have been a great place to visit.
These pictures sure lit up a bit of HAD in me.

Thanks for posting, very enjoyable to see.

I have also added a bunch of photos on the Razor and the Miscellanous forums. Alx

awsome pics i almost fell out of my chair. I'm starting to develop a strong affinity for j-nats thanks

What a sight! Thanks for sharing Alex.

Did you end up paying for another plane ticket on the way back to make up for the weight?

Wow, I'm glad I haven't gotten into Jnats or I'd have to go be alone right now.

Originally Posted by alx

Yesterday I went to the Feather Company Museum in Seki, Gifu Prefecture. Stepping into this beautifully displayed eleven gallery showplace opened up my eyes to how just how involved one company during the 20th century would have to be in order to stay in the forefront of the razor industry in Japan. Housed in a multi storied modern building the flow of the displays takes you from the ancient implements to remove facial hair like clam shells and obsidian to iron sand tamahagane steel blades and into the modern hollow ground blades most of us use.
Although a Japanese company museum, there are a lot of other makers represented in the folding straight razor section from other countries, but all in all the majority of the folders, disposables, clippers and double edges, advertising and associated ephemera in the central sections of this collection were made by the Feather Company. I was happy to find a couple groups of natural stone razor hones that were accompanied by place cards noting which barber shop this one or that one came from along with the name of the barber. Also you can see in the photos below some specimen stones retained in the collection, larger is always rarer and they have a few slabs so large that they could only be in a museum setting. I will post some photos of the razors in the Razor Section of SRP.
P.S. I also wanted to mention that at San Francisco International I went through a full body scanner and was asked to submit to a secondary test. Evidently the scan detected that my left palm contained a nano particle of some kind. They took a swab and ran it through an analyzer, negative on the nitrates and poisons, positive on the Kyoto toishi dust.

Just wanted to say thank you for sharing the photos; it is appreciated greatly. Sonny082