Yame Paper Lanterns

With an approximately 200 year history, Yame is Japan’s most famous paper lantern-manufacturing region. Using materials such as bamboo, Japanese paper, lacquer, sumac wax, and wood, ingenious traditional techniques are adopted in each step of the lantern-making process, and all of the mountain, water, flower, or birds paintings on the “suzumi”, “kinubari”, and other such laterns are hand-drawn. There are a plethora of paper lantern varieties, with some estimates saying as many as 3,000!

*About the Paper Lantern: Government-Designated Traditional Craft; first made in 1816; dimensions of Jumbo Paper Lantern - diameter: 3 meters (about 10 feet), height: 4.5 meters (about 15 feet), weight: 50 kilo grams (about 110 pounds)