Author: Hikifuda. Chairs. Yoshida Yakichi.
Title: [Isu Seizojin].
Description: Morioka (Iwate) 1891 (Meiji 24). Letterpress broadside 24x33cm; five chairs and a stool illustrated. Top corners repaired - I suspect it was in an album, mildly stained; pretty good. ¶ Advertising handbill for Yoshida Yakichi, a furniture, or at least chair, maker in Morioka - in northern Honshu. Maruya opened probably the first western furniture shop in Japan in the Ginza in 1872, probably selling imports to begin with. How quickly western furniture making for a Japanese market followed I don't know. The wealthy who wanted at least one western room to show off their modernity would likewise want to show off fine imported pieces. I'm sure there is a learned paper somewhere on western furniture making in c19th provincial Japan. If there isn't, here's a good place to start.

Keywords: trade catalogues trades c19th Japan asia architecture interiors furniture graphic applied arts advertising hikifuda meiji