Utsuwa
Utsuwa is a craft experiential restaurant in Tokyo. This restaurant aims to decolonise the stereotype towards craft to re-incorporate handmade Japanese crafts into their lifestyle.
In Japan, post COVID-19, craftsperson’s culture is in danger of disappearing. What can a designer do? Through discussion, I noticed a gap between the craftsperson and the user. Users think the crafts are something too precious to be used. On the other hand, craftsperson wishes their crafts to be used and they believe this is the way to be succeeded.
To approach this, the craft experiential restaurant Utsuwa was born. At Utsuwa the users could experience eating food using the crafts, which helps imagine how their dining experience looks and feels when crafts are part of their lifestyle. As well as decolonising the stereotype towards crafts, it could suggest having one lifelong lasting product, rather than owning many products. This project focus is on Japan, but this project has the potential of being a tool that could be adapted to other countries.
