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By Patricia Belyea
KYOTO JP Everything about tezomeya, located on the south side of Nijo Castle, whispers, “this is special.”
PLANT PIGMENTS
This botanical dyeing studio specializes in creating complex, muted colors using natural dyes from organic materials: bark, grasses, roots, petals, wood, and even insects.
Tezomeya has perfected the art of combining pigments to achieve its signature “comfortable” colors. For example, ni-iro, a warm orange hue, is created through a two-step process — first dyeing with pomegranate skin and then with Indian madder.
Even more magical is the source of tezomeya’s dye materials: a Chinese medicine supplier!
CLOTHING KNOW-HOW
I met Tomoko Kamihara when I visited tezomeya. One of the two owners, she explained the origins of the dyeing studio.
The founders originally worked in the clothing industry. They both left their jobs to start tezomeya — a dyeing studio creating colors with a retro aesthetic and a clothing company offering casual goods.
HAPPY T-SHIRTS
Tezomeya's T-shirts are created on vintage loop-wheel knitting machines. These machines take two to three days to knit what today’s high-speed machines accomplish in a few hours.
The result? Jersey shirts with no side seams and a wonderfully slubby texture. Made with organic cotton and dyed in Tezomeya’s rich botanical colors, these T-shirts are beyond special!
VISITING TEZOMEYA
When you enter tezomeya, you step right into the action.
Tomoko welcomes you. And Jin Kokubo, the dyeing specialist, stays busy in the studio — preparing plant matter or dunking fabrics into bubbling dye pots.
A small passageway to the right leads you to an attractive shop across an outdoor courtyard.
Be warned: if you’re anything like me, you’ll want everything in the store for your relaxed, arty lifestyle.
TEZOMEYA + OKAN ARTS
Working with Tomoko, Okan Arts designed a fun workshop for our Blue Japan Indigo Tour participants. The small cloth bag project involves pre-stitching shibori patterns, followed by a dip in a madder root dye bath to achieve a serene red.
Madder root may not be indigo, but it’s always good to expand our natural dye vocabulary!
tezomeya
+website
451 Taruya-cho, Nakagyo-ku, Kyoto 604-8322, Japan
+81-75-202-7655
Hours: 11:00–18:00
Store closed irregularly (for open days +check here)
Online Shop +click here
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ABOUT US: Okan Arts, a petite family business, is co-owned by mother-daughter duo Patricia Belyea and Victoria Stone. Patricia and Victoria sell Japanese textiles online, host creative quilting experiences, and lead quilting & textile tours to Japan.
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