"Clay Cut", decorative floral plate

Softness carved from hardness — Tsuchihasami decorative plate

This decorative plate is the work of Yuko Hayashi, ceramicist and fourth generation of the Koson Kiln (Kōson-gama), situated on the celebrated pottery lane — Chawanzaka — in the Higashiyama district of Kyoto.
An heir to a long lineage of potters, Hayashi has nonetheless forged her own path, developing an entirely original technique she calls tsuchihasami — literally, "clay scissors".

Her inspiration came from an age-old gesture in Japanese confectionery: shaping chrysanthemum flowers from wagashi sweet paste, petal by petal, with small scissors. Hayashi transposed this gesture into ceramics. On a disc of Seishi white porcelain — a warm, luminous white of her own creation, named after Xi Shi, one of the Four Great Beauties of ancient China — she cuts into the raw clay by hand, one incision at a time, coaxing flowers of extraordinary delicacy from the surface. The name is no coincidence: just as Xi Shi was said to possess a beauty beyond compare, this porcelain aspires to a whiteness that surpasses all others.

This is the paradox, and the genius, of her work: making the hard appear soft. Porcelain is one of the most unyielding materials. And yet, under Hayashi's scissors, it seems to unfurl like a living petal — trembling, weightless, on the verge of flight. Each cut demands extreme technical mastery: too much pressure, and the piece shatters. Too little, and the expression vanishes.

This plate is designed to adorn a living space. Placed on a surface or hung on a wall, it catches the light differently with every hour and season, revealing new reliefs and new shadows. It is a living work, in the sense that it changes with the eye that rests upon it.

Dimensions: W 28.5 cm × D 28.5 cm × H 2.3 cm
Material: Seishi white porcelain, tsuchihasami technique
Artist: Yuko Hayashi — Koson Kiln (Kōson-gama), Chawanzaka, Higashiyama, Kyoto