HONSHU - The good life begins with your feetSlippers originated in Japan about 170 years ago!
Slippers are familiar to Japanese people in their daily lives. Did you know that they originated in Japan? According to the data* at the Japan Kimono Museum (now the Matsu Naga Kimono Museum in Fukuyama City), slippers were born in the 19th century when the country was opened to the outside world. It is said that they were created by Risaburo Tokuno, who ran a tailoring shop in Tokyo. At that time, accommodations like modern hotels were still scarce, and many Westerners who had come to Japan to share their advanced technology used temples, shrines, and inns as places to stay. However, Westerners, who did not take off their shoes except for showering or sleeping, much less expose their bare feet in public, got into trouble when one after another they climbed onto the tatami mats with their feet in the dirt. Risaburo Tokuno was commissioned to make overshoes to be worn over shoes, and this is said to have been the beginning of slippers. Slippers gradually spread among Japanese people as Western-style footwear used in modern life in Western-style houses, and the style of slippers worn directly on the bare feet, rather than over shoes, took root. The slippers evolved into a more comfortable shape, leading to today's slippers. Although they are now a casual everyday item, slippers, which support our entire body weight on a daily basis, are actually filled with the technology and manufacturing traditions that have been accumulated throughout history. Honshu is now developing its original brand "SURIPPA" to pass on such Japanese traditions to the present. スリッパの発祥は約170年前の日本!
日本人にとって日常生活に馴染みのあるスリッパ。発祥は日本であることを知っていますか? 日本はきもの博物館(現・福山市松永はきもの資料館)の資料*によると、スリッパが誕生したのは19世紀の開国時。東京で仕立屋を営んでいた徳野利三郎氏の手によって生まれたとされています。 当時は現代のホテルのような宿舎がまだ少なく、先進技術を伝えるために来日していた多くの西洋人は、寺社や旅籠を宿泊先にしていました。しかし、シャワーや寝る時以外は靴を脱がず、ましてや人前で裸足をさらす習慣のない西洋人は、次々と土足で畳の間に上がってしまいトラブルに。 そこで徳野利三郎氏が依頼を受け、靴の上から履くオーバーシューズを製作をしたことがスリッパのはじまりと言われています。 その後スリッパは日本人の間でも、洋館のモダンな暮らしで使う西洋的な履物として徐々に広まりましたが、靴の上からではなく素足にそのまま履くスタイルが定着。より履きやすい形状に進化し、今日のスリッパの姿に至ります。 今では何気ない日用品のひとつとなっていますが、実は日々全体重を支えるスリッパには、歴史の中で積み重ねられた技術、ものづくりの伝統が詰まっています。 |