Have you heard of "mingei"?
Not the kind of craft you'd find behind glass in a museum, but ordinary things made by unnamed craftspeople for everyday use: tea bowls, brooms, garments, furniture. Objects nobody thought to sign their name to. A movement that began in Japan about a hundred years ago argued that real beauty lives in exactly these things.
This idea, known as the Mingei Movement, is one of the foundations tsuggu is built on. Here's a closer look at where it came from and what it means.
The Japan Folk Crafts Museum (Nihon Mingeikan) in Komaba, Meguro, Tokyo. Founded by Yanagi Sōetsu in 1936.
How the Mingei Movement began
The movement was started by Yanagi Sōetsu (1889–1961), a philosopher who studied at Tokyo Imperial University. After encountering Korean ceramics and being struck by their beauty, Yanagi turned his attention to everyday objects being made across Japan.
In 1925, Yanagi coined the word "mingei" together with potters Shoji Hamada and Kanjiro Kawai. It's a compound of "min" (people) and "gei" (craft) — folk craft. In 1926, the three published a manifesto proposing a museum dedicated to this idea, officially launching the movement. The Japan Folk Crafts Museum opened in Komaba, Tokyo, in 1936.
Japan at the time was industrializing quickly, and mass-produced goods were spreading fast. Yanagi was concerned that the hand-craft traditions passed down in regions across the country were disappearing.
Yanagi Sōetsu (1889–1961), the founder of the Mingei Movement.
The idea of "beauty in use"
At the center of Yanagi's thinking is a concept often translated as "beauty in use" (yō no bi).
"Yō" means practical use. Yanagi believed that real, healthy beauty isn't found in objects made to be admired, but in tools and vessels actually used in daily life. An object shaped by its region's climate and materials, handled and reused over and over in ordinary life, can hold more beauty than an expensive piece set aside for display. It was a genuine shift in how beauty was understood.
The piece below is a 17th-century plate from the Mino region of Gifu Prefecture. It wasn't made as a work of art — it was made to be used at the table — and yet it's held today as part of the Japan Folk Crafts Museum's collection.
17th-century Mino ware pottery from Gifu Prefecture, part of the Japan Folk Crafts Museum collection.
Not a rejection of fine art
One thing worth clarifying here: the Mingei Movement doesn't dismiss fine art or high-value craftsmanship.
What Yanagi argued was that beauty isn't reserved for celebrated art alone — that everyday objects made by nameless craftspeople hold just as much value. Fine art remains worth honoring on its own terms. Mingei simply pointed to a second, separate measure of beauty, found in daily life rather than on a pedestal.
What tsuggu carries forward from mingei
tsuggu exists to translate the value found in Japan's regions into everyday life around the world — and this idea sits at the core of how we think about the craft we bring to you.
A well-made object isn't meant to be displayed and left alone. It's meant to be used, to wear in, to grow more comfortable and more itself with time. Beauty shows up when something is placed naturally into daily life, not set apart from it. That was Yanagi's insight a hundred years ago, and it's the same value we want to bring to people today.
A calm, considered life. The warmth of something made by hand. Things built to last, and to be loved more the longer they're used. These aren't uniquely Japanese ideas — they're things people everywhere already want. Japan's regional crafts happen to have been practicing them for well over a century.
Every piece tsuggu introduces is made to be used, not just looked at. That's the idea behind "beauty in use," and it's where tsuggu starts.
Sources:
Japan Folk Crafts Association — "What is Mingei?"
Japan Folk Crafts Museum — "Yanagi Sōetsu and the Museum"
Image credits:
Japan Folk Crafts Museum exterior: © Kamemaru2000, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
Portrait of Yanagi Sōetsu: photographer unknown, public domain in Japan and the United States
Mino ware pottery: © Jean-Pierre Dalbéra, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0