Quote Originally Posted by Tierdaen View Post
Yes, the kanji are the right way up and say "Iwasaki select".

I am no expert but I've heard conflicting stories about whether or not any of the Iwasaki family actually sold or approved stones themselves. There seems to be a lot of marketing fog in the Jnat market and for some reason Non-Japanese (and non-Chinese) are prone to trusting stamps simply because they have Chinese characters on them (kanji means Chinese character, fwiw).

The Iwasaki-stamped stones at aframestokyo, as a general example, seem to be Nakayama and are not extremely hard. Takeshi told me once that they might be suitable for older kamisori like Henkotsu which are usually a bit softer, but wouldn't be ideal for finishing modern kamisori or harder Western razors.
Could you please write "Iwasaki select" in kanji for us, then it's easier to use it to search and such.