Restoration of Earthen Workshops for the Traditional Local Industry by Collaboration of Owners, Artisans, Architects and Volunteers

Ref.: 2
Área temática: 01 Integridad física de los paisajes urbanos históricos
Fecha de recepción: 03/11/2008

AUTORES (* Autor principal)

IZUMIDA, Hideo * (Japón) - Toyohashi University of Technology

ABSTRACT

Wajima is one of the historical cities in Noto Peninsula, Ishikawa, Japan and is famed for its traditional lacquer ware industry. As the industry needs sensitive indoor climate condition, the owners have constructed the earthen workshops that have become an essential urban fabric in city centre.
However, the strong earthquake hit the region in March 25, 2006, and damaged most of the earthen workshops. The owners and local architects almost gave up to repair and restore the damaged workshops as they did not know to whom they had to commission the repair work and the cost would be very huge. Wajima ought to lose traditional industry together with historical landscape in city centre.
Receiving the emergency news from Wajima, the Research Unit of Local Techniques founded by me and Dr. Marcelo Nishiyama in 2002 took the initiative in setting up of the restoration projects, and immediately formed an investigation team consisting of university scholars and experienced master plasterers. We visited the site in April 14, 2007 to survey the damaging conditions and to seek the possibility of repair and restoration. After the survey, we recognized that most of the damaged workshops might be restored as the wall clay just slipped down from timber frame, and talked to the owners and the local architects about the real situation and proposed possible way of the restoration.
The owners could not afford to restore their workshops just after they have born the large cost for repair of their houses. Instead, we proposed phased restoration works with support of NGOs and individual volunteers because the master plasterers wanted to contribute to the society by their skills, and university and college students needed to experience restoration work under the skilled plasterers.
The paper describes the process of setting up and execution of the restoration project, and concludes that traditional craftsmanship is necessary to maintain the local cultural heritage and to restore the damaged heritage, and scholars can support the restoration by networking among skilled artisans, architects and students.

BIBLIOGRAFÍA