Haku Glass haku硝子

Who is Haku Glass?

Haku Glass, haku硝子, is the working name of the Tokyo craftsman Yoshihiro Mitamura (三田村義広). His site's profile lists the brand as established on 1 April 2010 and him as a member of the Edo Kiriko Cooperative (江戸切子協同組合), and its commerce disclosure puts the shop at a first-floor address in Morishita, Koto, Tokyo. Beyond his own shop, his site lists twelve stockists, department-store cases from central Tokyo to Fukuoka among them, plus two galleries: HULS Gallery Tokyo and Garanto, Takaoka, Toyama.

What marks his cutting?

Haku Glass's own site describes the work as a fusion: delicate cuts of the traditional patterns, kagome (籠目, basket weave), nanako (魚子, fish roe) and shippo (七宝), combined with bold, dynamic cutting, built into what the site calls a new world of Edo Kiriko. The concept page puts the same idea in four words, bold yet delicate (大胆かつ繊細に), and says every piece is carved and polished one at a time, by hand. The catalogue on his own site backs the pattern claim up directly: alongside the bolder, freer designs sits a kiku-kagome (菊籠目) piece, the chrysanthemum-and-basket-weave lattice, one of the older traditional Edo Kiriko names.

What do we carry from Haku?

We currently carry five pieces from Haku, all cut in the same house style: a wide skin of colour left standing around each cut rather than ground back to a bare outline. The Homura flame sake cup, the Homura whisky glass in blue and the same cut in green all carry his flame pattern. The kiku-kagome whisky glass is cut with the pattern his own catalogue names directly, and the Kaika sake cup is cut with a blooming design. Browse the Haku collection to see the current range, since what is on the shelf shifts as pieces sell through.

How I came to carry it

I went to Haku's shop and workshop in Morishita on a buying trip to Tokyo, 26 June 2022. What I remember most is the shelf: a dense, tightly cut cup that read close to nanako work, a cup carved with a raised wave in relief instead of straight cut lines, a goldfish carved into another with its reserved tag still sitting beside it, and a crate of finished guinomi lined up in the same bold, asymmetric swirl his own site describes when it pairs delicate traditional patterns with bold, dynamic cutting. Further back, a craftsman worked at a cutting-wheel bench with a crate of tumblers beside him. I do not know which of the pieces I photographed that day are Mitamura's own hand rather than another cutter's stock on his shelves, so I am not claiming that here; what I can say is that this is the shop, and these are close to the pieces we picked from it. I wrote up that same trip in more detail in our story of three Tokyo Edo Kiriko workshops.

How do you look after it?

Wash Haku glass the way we wash any cut crystal or soda-lime piece: by hand, in lukewarm water with a little neutral detergent, never in the dishwasher. Our cut-glass care guide has the full routine, including how to store it afterwards.