5 star Koukaboku inkstick ( 五星紅花墨 )-

Product information

Six generations before today's Kobaien, Matsui Motoyasu travelled to Nagasaki in 1739 to sit with ink masters of Qing China, exchanging centuries of craft in a single winter.

From that meeting came Koukaboku — "the ink of flowers" — five-star, ground from pure rapeseed oil-smoke for a clarity few inks equal: pure black at full strength, warming to a soft, tea-toned grey as it is diluted.

An inkstick, unlike most things one buys, does not simply age — it ripens. Laid away in a dry room, its ink deepens and its line quietens over the years, the way a cellared bottle finds its character in silence.

We can note the year of your stick's making on a free certificate of manufacture, and, where a particular year is still in stock, prepare one on request — a small provenance to mark the start of its own slow maturing.

Keep it as you would a good vintage: somewhere dark, somewhere still. What you grind today is fine work. What you set aside may, in a decade, become something rarer.

The meaning of the product name is as follows:

五 ( Itsutsu : five )

星 ( hoshi : star )

紅 ( kou : crimson )

花 ( ka: flower )

墨 ( boku : ink )

The smallest size 5star Koukaboku ( size 1/3 ) has a different surface design from the other size 5star Koukabokus. However, the five dots indicating 5star are engraved on it as well.

Disclaimer

The ordered items will be shipped from Japan in about 5 to 7 working days.
Free certificate of manufacture service available Perfect for buying this item as 🎁 gifts or as 💰an investment, etc!!
We have contracts with artisans in Japan, including Kobaien, to sell their rare and finest products to customers around the world at the lowest possible cost. For this reason, we do not accept cancellations, returns or refunds for orders made at the customer's request. This is because we do not include the costs of returns or cancellations in the sales price in order to keep the sales price as low as possible.
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