d the Nishi Sarayama potters appropriate the Takatori style and name that after World War II the area surrounding their kilns was officially renamed 'Takatori,' while the area of the defunct Higashi Sarayama kiln to the east retained the older name, Nishijin.At least half a dozen workshops were active in the Nishi Sarayama area from the middle of the 1880s until the 1940s, producing a wide variety of ceramics, including industrial pieces such as ceramic barrels; pump spouts and acid resistant storage containers. After the war, cheaply made metal and plastic vessels reduced the market for many of the ceramic items produced there. Only one kiln, that of the Kamei family (which claims a member of a Higashi Sarayama potting family as an ancestor) has succeeded in thriving by riding the crest of renewed interest in the tea ceremony, particularly in the postwar period. Another Nishi Sarayama potting family, named Hara, now maintains a Takatori style kiln elsewhere in Fukuoka city. Interestingly, some members of the original Takatori families returned to potting after their preliminary abandonment of the profession. During the Meiji period, Takatori Eiichi, head of one of the four family branches at the end of the Edo period, headed several kilns that produced mostly small tablewares and tea ceremony utensils. Production was not, however, continued by his heirs after his death in 1910. Takatori families in Tsuzumi and Koishiwara seem to have kept some potting skills alive as a result of their close proximity to the active folk/utilitarian ceramic industry at Koishiwara, but significant production by these families had ceased long before, and the increased industrialization of the Japanese ceramics industry prior to World War II resulted in a gradual loss of those skills that had survived. Takatori Ware TodayAt present, Takatori style kilns exist not only in the western part of Fukuoka city and in Tsuzumi (see entrance to the contemporary Takat...
