Have you ever had a forging experience?

Have you ever had a forging experience?
I had the opportunity to experience the forging experience program offered by Sankyo Corporation　(https://sangyoco.co.jp/),  a company that manufactures and sells metal products in Tomo-Cho, Fukuyama City, Hiroshima Prefecture. Here is the map.

Participants can make trays, pans, incense holders, and other tools they can use at home and outdoors for a long time in about two hours. The idea behind the project is that "by incorporating the traditional technique of making anchors, which has not changed for more than 100 years, into the daily lives of the general public, we hope to make people more aware of the technique and help pass it on to future generations. Sangyo started the project in 2009.
The factory has a variety of iron sheets of different sizes and thicknesses, from which participants can choose to make the object of their choice (¥5,000-¥10,450, including tax). I decided on an incense burner.

You can choose what to make from a selection of materials.

The staff, who are forge workers, heat the iron plate in a coke oven to 1,000-1,200 degrees Celsius, and dexterously He lifts it and places it on the age-old anvil. Encouraged by his careful instruction, I fearlessly tapped the heated anvil with a hammer. The hammered surface gives the surface texture and flavor. White ash came out as he wiped the bright red iron. The orange-red iron sheet changed to a dull red, and as it cooled, it returned to the familiar color of iron. After some tapping, he heated it again. I repeated this process several times while bending around and leveling the bottom to form the desired shape.

Finally, after engraving about 15 characters, a quick-drying black coating was applied to complete the project. When I held the finished product in my hands, I wanted many people to experience this excitement.

Craftsmanship support the manufacture of forged anchors is supported. The number of ironworks that manufacture anchors using this technique has dwindled to only a few in Japan. To keep this valuable traditional technique alive, the company took over the business of an ironworks with forging technology in 2005, which had gone out of business due to Aging management. The following year, the company utilized this technology to launch the furniture brand TAonTA.

President Hayama said, "Nowadays, Japanese craftsmanship can not sell without brand power. One of the ways to achieve this is to have people experience the story of manufacturing and use the products for a long time, along with their memories. We want to create a synergistic effect with tourism by having visitors experience traditional forging techniques and lengthen their stay in Tomonoura.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)