ca. early to mid twentieth century
10" x 7" x 7", 25.5 cm x 18 cm x 18 cm

About 15 pieces of hand loomed cotton cloth--and what beautiful examples!-- have been hand sewn together to create this komebukuro, or rice bag, which has seemingly never been used.

A komebukuro is so named because it was fashioned with an appeal toward the 'fancy.'  Rice used as offering to a temple during a festival season would be offered to the temple in one of these 'flashy' bags, the rich piecing of cloth being a kind of decoration.  (Actually, this bag may not have been used as a komebukuro but more for quotidian functions, but it is of the type that we refer to as komebukuro.)

This bag is a marvelous example of Japanese patchwork, and is still very much able to be used as a bag, as a pillow or simply as a collectible to be admired.

Recommended.