Nemoto Glass 根本硝子工芸

Who is Nemoto Glass?

Nemoto Glass names its founder as Nemoto Yukio, born in Koto ward, Tokyo, on 21 September 1936. The workshop's own memorial page says he was already orphaned and only eight years old when he fled the wartime firebombing of Koto ward for Chiba with his younger sister, and that he apprenticed under the glass cutter Tamura Tokuzo from the age of thirteen in 1949. He founded the workshop in 1959, and in 2009 received the Medal with Yellow Ribbon, a national honour his own site calls the first ever given inside the Edo Kiriko world. He kept cutting until his death in 2014.

How did the family carry it forward?

The workshop's own memorial page names the line after Yukio: his eldest son, Nemoto Tatsuya, as the second generation, and Tatsuya's son, Nemoto Kosho, as the third. Kosho's own profile page says he joined the family workshop in 2015 and has since won prizes at the Edo Kiriko New Works Exhibition in Ginza in several different years, alongside solo showings under his own Kosho Crystal name.

What marks Nemoto's cutting?

Nemoto Glass cuts butterflies, a harp motif and peacocks alongside Shizuku, a droplet pattern, across the whisky glasses we carry. Our own listings say Edo Kiriko rarely uses animal figures, since the craft is built around geometric repeats rather than pictures, and that a bird or a butterfly asks more of the cutter because both sides of the glass have to agree once it is turned in the hand. Every surface is polished by hand, a habit our own listings say has passed unhurried through three generations of the same family.

What do we carry from Nemoto?

We currently carry ten whisky glasses from Nemoto, the same figure the shop's own Nemoto collection page gives, cut by Tatsuya and Kosho across four patterns. There is a blue butterfly cut and a pink butterfly cut, both by Tatsuya, plus his peacock cut in amber gold purple and again in amber gold red. Kosho cuts a harp motif in black, amber blue and amber purple, and the Shizuku droplet pattern in amber gold, amber blue and amber purple. Browse the Kiriko collection to see Nemoto's range alongside our other kiriko houses, since what is on the shelf shifts as pieces sell through.

How do you look after it?

Wash Nemoto glass by hand in warm water with a soft sponge, never a scourer, and rinse it twice so no soap film dulls the cut. Keep it out of the dishwasher and away from sudden changes in temperature, the same routine as any cut-glass piece we carry. Our cut-glass care guide has the full routine, and our Edo Kiriko guide covers the wider technique Nemoto shares with other Tokyo cutters.