Jonathan Garma - Jan 01 2020
NOUSAKU - TIME BELL CANDLE
TThe Time Bell Candle is a meditative candle for the brooding mind. As its flame burns, small pins gently fall into its brass saucer, creating a dulcet, bell-like tone that ring out to indicate the inevitable passing of time. It’s the perfect addition to any household to create a relaxing and reflective mood - simply put a candle in the brass holder, insert the pins into the candle and light the flame.
The city of Takaoka
Manufactured in the city of Takaoka in the Toyama Prefecture, a unique combination of sand and brass is melted at temperatures of at least 1100 degrees before being poured into its mold, a technique known as green sand casting. The brass candlesticks are left without paint or coating to allow it to mature with age. Brass is a sturdy metal that changes colour with time and use, and as we change and grow with the passing of time, so will the candlestick. It complements the resonant sounds of the pins hitting the brass by creating visual changes on its body as well. The result is an ever-changing brass surface that is illuminated by the light of a swaying fire, a calming visual to match the subdued tones created by its bell-like base.
Takaoka Copperware, a certified traditional Japanese craft has been a pride of Takaoka City since the Edo period. The craftsman at Nousaku have adopted these techniques, manufacturing each candlestick and pin individually with care, love and passion. Founded in 1916, the craftsmen at Nousaku strive to create a unique, high-quality line of products that bring storied Japanese traditions to the modern home. Time Bell Candle is a superb blending of the traditional and the contemporary, drawing on traditional Japanese aesthetics to create the perfect addition to any modern home.
The Japanese aesthetics behind the creation of Time Bell Candle were once seen to be integral to daily life. They encompassed ideas of Zen, which were once considered to be the fountainhead of Japanese culture. The resonance of the sound as each pin drops is not unlike the sounds of Buddhist alters. It draws from the storied Japanese aesthetic of wabi-sabi, the act of appreciating the imperfect, impermanent and incomplete in nature. It is a blending of the ideas wabi, which expresses simplicity, impermanence, flaws, and imperfection with sabi, which displays and expresses the effect that time has on us and the world around us. The asymmetry of the pins in the candles, the changing of the brass that comes with age, the long and resident tones that slowly die out – these are elements within wabi-sabi designed to help us to reflect on the beauty that accompanies the impermanence of all things.
Let the calm, dulcet tones of the pins, the burning, subdued flame of the candle and the tradition of wabi-sabi create a meditative mood a way only Japan knows how. Each set comes complete with 2 candles, 3 nails and wax shavings.
