niime 百科

Encyclopedia of niime

At the end of last year, Comfort Is Beautiful was finally brought into the world. A discussion event centred on Tamaki Niime’s very first book turned into a passionate exchange of ideas, with participants gathered informally around Ms Tamaki in the tatami room of the Niime residence. Through the many words and reflections collected in the book, they explored the essence of the tamaki niime brand. From there, the conversation naturally expanded and deepened, leading everyone to reflect not only on the brand’s one-of-a-kind approach to craftsmanship, but also on the future of Nishiwaki and of Japanese society itself.

〈Continued from Part 1〉

Tamaki: Earlier, Mr Omori, you said there are things that simply can’t be put into words, right? So if someone asks mewhy we made this book in the first place, my answer is: I wanted our staff to read it. When you’re making things, it’s hard to share this way of thinking—this mindset and these feelings behind what we create. I end up saying the same things over and over to different staff members, but I always feel they don’t quite understand. It doesn’t really get through. So… does that mean even after reading this book, it still won’t get through?

Koshikawa: That’s why I think it’s something people should read intuitively—more with their senses than with analysis.

Tamaki: If they read it that way, will it really get through?

Omori: Speaking for myself, I think it’s wonderful when people can do their work because they genuinely love it. That’s an ideal situation. If everyone could work that way, it would certainly be amazing.

Tamaki: Mm-hmm.

Omori: But when I was helping out at tamaki niime, I talked with the people on the production floor, and I sometimes felt that if we put too much emphasis on the idea of loving what you do, it might actually confuse them. I don’t think it’s really about whether you like something or not. Rather than saying you’re doing it because you love it, Ms Tamaki, I’d describe it as being completely serious about it. In today’s slang, people might say you’re “for real” or “all in.” After all, even if you started because you loved it, there were times when your work didn’t sell, and you went through difficult periods, weren’t there? At least during those times, I don’t think it was a question of liking or disliking what you were doing. If anything, weren’t there moments when you actually came to dislike it?

Tamaki: Dislike what?

Omori: The work itself.

Tamaki: You mean my job?

Omori: Didn’t you ever feel that way?

Tamaki: No. Never.

Omori: The book does mention that there was a difficult period. So I think that, at that point, it wasn’t really about whether you liked it or not. What comes across more is that you were all in—completely serious about it.

Tamaki: Aren’t loving something and being all in the same thing?

Omori: I don’t think so.

Tamaki: To me, they’re the same. …Maybe that’s where we see things differently.

Omori: I think what’s more important is putting aside the whole idea of liking or disliking something and simply becoming completely committed. That’s the message I thought was more important to convey.

Tamaki: I get it! It’s not that I’m trying to say that liking something is what’s important. Are you saying it’s better to describe it as being all in rather than saying you’re enjoying it?

Omori: Yeah. Especially these days, since I’ve become a manager and we have younger employees joining the company…

Tamaki: So it’s about how to motivate them? You’re saying it’s better to tell them, ‘Take it seriously’?

Omori: Well, even saying ‘Take it seriously’ doesn’t quite sound right. It’s more about creating an environment where they naturally become serious…

Tamaki: How do you create an environment where people naturally become serious?

Omori: Well, living in Tokyo gives us a certain advantage in that respect because it’s a highly competitive society. One good thing about competition is that it almost inevitably makes people go all in. Whether they like it or not becomes secondary.

Tamaki: So they reach a point where they have no choice but to do it?

Omori: Not exactly. It’s more that nobody likes losing.

Tamaki: But there are people who don’t mind losing.

Omori: Sure, there are. But since we’re already in a competitive environment…

Tamaki: Well, that’s because you’re in Tokyo.

Omori: Yeah, maybe.

Tamaki: It’s much harder in the countryside. In fact, a lot of people here aren’t living in that kind of competitive society.

Omori: One way to become truly serious is that, after all, we’re living in a capitalist society.

Tamaki: But the moment someone chooses to move to Tokyo, they’re already the kind of person who’s all in, aren’t they? They go to the city, get a job, and face all kinds of competition. There’s this feeling that they can’t go back home having done things halfway. I’m not saying people in the countryside don’t have those feelings, but I do feel there’s a difference in intensity. Still, I don’t think the atmosphere in Tokyo is necessarily a good thing. People keep fighting until they’re completely worn out—almost like they’re shells of themselves. So what I’m really talking about is being all in in a way that doesn’t leave you exhausted, where that intensity can actually turn into enjoyment.

Omori: Put simply, you could say that’s what it means to love what you do. But that’s fine if it’s just a hobby. This is business, after all.

Tamaki: No, business is important.

Omori: I think it’s great to love what you do. But if it ends there—if it’s only about loving it—it won’t become a business.

Tamaki: That’s true! Ah, so you mean not becoming attached in the wrong way. Since it’s a business, you can’t ignore money. But if you suddenly tell people, ‘Go increase sales,’ people who’ve never really thought that way can lose all motivation.

Omori: Ah… (nods)

Tamaki: The moment they’re told, ‘Numbers, numbers, numbers,’ they switch into a mode of thinking, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’ So instead I say, ‘Why don’t we start by enjoying it? Let’s have fun first.’ But… that’s not really the complete answer either, is it?

Omori: No.

Tamaki: So what should we do?

Koshikawa: Ms Tamaki, since the end of last year you’ve often said that you want to lead by example for your staff. It’s not exactly ‘Follow me,’ nor is it an old-fashioned apprenticeship system, but rather passing things on in a positive way. Watching tamaki niime, what really stands out to me—and it’s something that’s written in Feeling Good Is Beautiful as well—is the idea that it’s more important to move your hands and feet than to overthink things. That’s something really…

Tamaki: At the highest level, that’s not quite right. You have to use your head too.

Koshikawa: That’s true. I agree with that, but…

Tamaki: Exactly. Isn’t it easy to end up leaning too far one way or the other? Depending on the staff member, I might tell one person, ‘Use your head more,’ while telling another, ‘Stop overthinking everything.’ But when I think about what I should say to everyone as a whole… I end up not knowing what to say.

Omori: Still, I think what the book says about getting your hands moving first is important. Some people start with action, while others start with thinking. But that feeling of not quite knowing what you’re doing can gradually turn into excitement and eventually become genuine motivation. In the end, it’s by moving your hands—by taking action—that things begin to change.

Tamaki: That’s why lately I’ve been thinking that whether you like something or not can come later. First, just try it. One thing we’ve started recently is taking turns feeding the animals. Until now, Ishikura had been coming in at seven every morning to do it all by himself, but I realised we couldn’t keep relying on him forever. So I made it a mandatory rotation—just like in elementary school, when everyone took turns feeding the class rabbits. I wanted everyone to get involved at least once, so we started rotating the responsibility. I really think it’s been a better approach. Of course, people complain that they don’t know how to do it or that it’s inconvenient, but unless they actually try, nothing will change. I waited a year or two, hoping everyone would naturally grow closer to the animals, but it never happened. We ended up with some people who knew the animals well and others who barely knew anything about them. So I thought, first of all, let’s make it part of the system—not based on whether people like it or not. Then, if we come up with a better way later, we can always change it. …But when people talk about things like how to improve Nishiwaki City or how to shape the future of Japan, it always seems to begin with a written plan. ‘Let’s move forward with this strategy,’ ‘Let’s all share the plan first.’ That approach just doesn’t feel right to me at all.

Koshikawa: So instead of that, you’d rather just get started first?

Tamaki: No, that’s exactly what doesn’t happen. People feel they can’t begin until they have a goal. They try to complete everything in their heads before taking the first step, don’t they? And I find myself wondering whether that’s really the way Japan should move forward.

Koshikawa: Right now I’m turning this year’s ‘Looking Back, Looking Ahead’ interview for the annual Encyclopedia of niime: New Year’s feature into an article. During the interview, Ms Tamaki, you talked about having everyone take turns caring for the animals. As I listened, it struck me that niime Village has really begun to come to life. What I mean is that, as members of the village, people are expected to take on responsibilities like caring for the animals. It has become part of what it means to belong to the community. Of course, some people may not be comfortable around animals, but you still create a rotation, and everyone shares the responsibility. When I look at niime Village as a community, it feels like the organisation is evolving into something much more village-like. I thought it was a fascinating example of a new way of organising people.

Omori: Sorry—I feel like I’ve been doing all the talking. But even if everything in this book can’t be fully put into words, I’ve always felt that what Ms Tamaki has been doing is incredibly rational—in the best sense of the word. I mean that it’s fundamentally sound. For example, around the world today, especially in Europe and North America, people talk about improving the environment and promote ideas like the SDGs. They often speak of balancing economic growth with environmental protection.

Tamaki: You’re getting pretty deep now. (laughs)

Omori: Yes. SDGs are translated as the Sustainable Development Goals, but this whole idea of ‘balancing’ the economy and the environment…

Tamaki: It’s fundamentally unrealistic.

Omori: Exactly. And that’s something this book clearly points out. It reminds us that human beings, plants, and animals are all living things. And if you think about it that way, the Earth itself is a living thing too, isn’t it? Everything is alive. In other words, we’re all included within it. We are all part of the Earth, connected to one another through a continuous cycle.

Tamaki: Exactly.

Omori: So, in contrast to the Western approach to the SDGs, I think this presents a distinctly Japanese way of thinking. It speaks about what true, fundamental circulation really is. Even the fact that animals are part of everyday life and work here breaks down the boundary between people and nature. And if you look even more closely, keeping so many dogs is actually incredibly rational. Ever since the Jōmon period, dogs have served as a bridge between nature and human beings. For some reason, they’re the one animal humans have always lived alongside. Even in Princess Mononoke, Moro—the wolf goddess—appears as a messenger from the natural world to warn humanity. And the dogs at tamaki niime are Akita-wolf hybrids, aren’t they? Starting from there? (laughs) It’s remarkably logical. To an outsider, it might look like, ‘What on earth is this person doing?’ But no—they’re acting as a bridge between nature and people.

Tamaki: Indeed.

Omori: Everything is connected. Once everyone working here truly understands that, there’s no doubt they’ll think, ‘What an incredible company this is!’ I spend my time in Tokyo working with huge corporations, talking to CEOs, and conversations like this never come up. It’s just not very interesting.

Tamaki: You should tell them.

Omori: Even if I did, they wouldn’t understand. (laughs) What I really hope is that, at the very least, people around here recognise that someone who can genuinely support Japan’s future—someone who can make it truly sustainable—is right here. Right here in Nishiwaki, the ‘Center of Japan.’ …Am I praising you too much?

Tamaki: I honestly think it’s the most rational approach. But you’re right—it hasn’t really been understood yet. That’s definitely true. (laughs)

Koshikawa: That’s why I’ve always felt the way Ms Tamaki moves forward is a lot like assembling a puzzle. It doesn’t start with a finished blueprint. Sometimes it even looks like, ‘What on earth are they doing?’ There are moments when I wonder whether even Ms Tamaki knows exactly where it’s all going. (laughs)

Tamaki: Oh, I know.

Koshikawa: Right—you do. But you trust your intuition, you believe in yourself, and you trust your staff as well. Then, when the whole picture finally comes into view, it’s like, ‘Ah, the puzzle is complete.’ That’s what tamaki niime‘s journey has felt like to me—a steady accumulation of those pieces. And I also get the sense that you’re carrying several much bigger puzzles at the same time.

Tamaki: Always. That’s true.

Koshikawa: I imagine all of those puzzles are moving forward simultaneously. Even from the outside, you can feel that sense of excitement. I just hope more people who want to build something together will gather here…

Tamaki: Yes—if only more people would join us.

Koshikawa: Yes, I think it would be truly exciting if more people gathered here. I still remember the opening party in 2016 when you moved into the current Shop & Lab. The very first thing you said was, ‘It all starts here, from the Center of Japan!’ (laughs)

Tamaki: Did I really? Well, it is the Center of Japan.

Koshikawa: Back then, ‘the Center of Japan’ wasn’t considered fashionable or appealing at all. Most people didn’t see it that way. But you stood there and confidently declared, ‘I came here because this is the Center of Japan!’ I remember thinking, she’s already operating on an entirely different level. It was so typical of you.

Tamaki: …I feel like we’re finally starting to unravel it all.

Omori: One sentence in the book really stood out to me: ‘I want this brand to become one that people will one day look back on and say, “That was the turning point.”’ I think that’s one of the book’s key messages. Truly valuable things always take time before people understand them. Picasso is a good example, and the same is true for so many things in this world. It’s a bit like how we sometimes don’t fully appreciate our parents until ten or twenty years later. By then, they may no longer be with us.

Tamaki: That’s true.

Omori: The idea of time itself feels incredibly important. Whenever I talk with Ms Tamaki Niime, I sense a very long perspective on time. But then I go back to Tokyo, where everything is about hitting quarterly targets and producing numbers every three months. That mindset pulls us farther and farther away from what really matters. Human beings were originally creatures that knew how to wait. Before rice cultivation, we were hunters. From morning until night, people simply waited for the right moment to catch their prey.

Tamaki: Mm-hmm.

Omori: We lived that way throughout the twenty thousand years of the Jōmon period. Those instincts must still exist somewhere in our DNA. I believe that by working at tamaki niime, people can rediscover that part of themselves.

Tamaki: If they become conscious of it. If they realise it… Maybe that’s the key. I think there are already some staff members who have noticed it.

Koshikawa: I’ve always felt that the way people learn at tamaki niime is through experience—through actually feeling it with their bodies. I used to work as a graphic designer, and graphic design requires both logic and intuition. After all, it’s part of the advertising world, so everything you create has a purpose. You can’t just make whatever you want the way you might with fine art. Nowadays, everything is done on computers, but back then I developed my sense of design by repeatedly cutting and pasting things by hand. That’s why, when I look at tamaki niime and see the looms, I really understand how important craftsmanship is—how important it is to move your hands and to think with your hands.

Tamaki: These days you can buy just about anything. Before people even try making something themselves, they simply click a button on Amazon, and they’re done. Especially for people who don’t work in manufacturing, it’s become difficult to experience that process of thinking while working with your hands, only to end up somewhere completely different from what you originally imagined—and discovering that you’ve made something even better than you expected. That’s exactly why tamaki niime has to keep creating things that can only be made here. Especially now that AI and all these new technologies are emerging. And I don’t think this applies only to what we create at tamaki niime. It also applies to how we build Nishiwaki and even how Japan should move forward. Since 2026 is the Year of the Horse, I wish people would think, ‘Maybe we should raise horses.’

Koshikawa: I interviewed you for the Encyclopedia of niime the other day, and every time I talk with you, you say something that makes me go, ‘Wait… what?!’ (laughs)

Tamaki: By the way, I’ve already bought a horse. It’ll be arriving soon from Hokkaido. It’s a banba draft horse that weighs about 800 kilograms.

https://hokkaidolikers.com/archives/84530

Koshikawa: So it’s one of those huge horses that used to compete in Ban’ei Racing at Obihiro Racecourse in Hokkaido.

Tamaki: Since it’s the Year of the Horse, I want it to make the rounds through Nishiwaki. I’ll deliver our products by horse, so please look forward to it! The distance between the Niime House and the Lab is just about perfect. Right now we’re using a tuk-tuk to shuttle people around, but one vehicle isn’t enough, so I thought, a horse would be perfect. It’s my ‘horse- drawn carriage project.’ Wouldn’t that be wonderful? It would make everything so much more fun.

Koshikawa: …Right.

Tamaki: One of the staff even asked me, ‘Are horses allowed to travel on roads where cars drive?’ I said, ‘That’s not the point! Horses were here first!’ Do you see what I mean? Roads originally existed for horses. Why would we even need to ask that question?

Koshikawa: Like the historic Silver Mine Carriage Road.

https://www.gin-basha.jp/about/history/

Tamaki: Exactly. Weren’t paved roads originally built for horse-drawn carriages? And that wasn’t even so long ago—what, about sixty years?

Koshikawa: When I was a child, just over fifty years ago—around 1970—you still saw horse-drawn wagons travelling along the prefectural roads, which are now national highways. At least that was the case in the mountain villages of Taka.

Tamaki: Right? It wasn’t all that long ago. We’re not talking about hundreds of years in the past. Mr Omori, by the time you were a child, were they already gone? You never saw them?

Omori: We didn’t have horses in Nishiwaki, but we did have cows.

Tamaki: See? We did!

Participant O: There were cows in the rice fields all the time. My family’s main household kept a cow and used it for farming until power tillers became common. That was probably up until the 1950s.

Tamaki: Exactly! See? Let’s raise cows too. We still don’t have any cows at tamaki niime. I’d love to have some.

Omori: And back then, you could drink truly delicious fresh milk.

Tamaki: See…? I bet some of you are starting to think, ‘Maybe I’d like to try raising one.’ It really wasn’t that long ago, was it?

Participant O: About fifty or sixty years ago.

Tamaki: Not even a hundred years ago. So if you think about it that way, it’s still possible to bring it back. Let’s do it!

Koshikawa: Would anyone else like to say something? Mr I, how about you?

Omori: I imagine everyone here is a tamaki niime fan, so let’s hear from you.

Tamaki: What did you think, Mr I?

Participant I: Well… if I had to sum up this book in one sentence, I’d say it was the answer key to understanding Ms Tamaki. For such a long time…

Tamaki: Yes! It really has been a long time. Thank you for all your support.

Participant I: I’ve been following you ever since you first came to Nishiwaki. I’ve been visiting your shop ever since then. But, to be honest, you’ve always been rather difficult to understand. (laughs)

Tamaki and everyone: (laughs)

Participant I: But just as Koshikawa said earlier, you’re like a puzzle—almost like a three-dimensional puzzle. With every page I turned, another piece fell into place, and I’d think, ‘Ah, I see.’ I’m not sure everything has completely sunk in yet, but I was able to make sense of it in my own way. It really felt like I was finally putting the pieces together. Even though it’s a book you could read straight through in one sitting, I felt it deserved to be read very carefully. In fact, I kept getting sleepy in the middle of reading it. (laughs)

Tamaki: No way!

Participant I: I’d realise, ‘Oh… I nodded off again.’

Tamaki: Really? That makes me happy!

Participant I: I kept telling myself I wouldn’t say anything about the book until I’d finished reading it, so I tried really hard to get through it…

Tamaki: But you kept falling asleep?

Participant I: It was like a sleeping pill. (laughs) But I grew up in the countryside, so it was actually very easy for me to relate to what you were saying. We had cows, and we’d get milk from the neighbour’s goats. We also kept sheep for their wool and chickens for their eggs. The chickens roamed freely outside, and it was my job to gather them up and put them back in the coop. In those days, most babies were born at home. I was born at home myself.

Tamaki: Really?!

Koshikawa: With the help of a midwife.

Participant I: That’s right. We spread manure on the fields, and when I was a child I hated how the smell clung to the laundry. But I also learned that it was what made the sweet potatoes sweeter. Those things just became part of life naturally.

Tamaki: That was simply everyday life for you.

Participant I: It was. But I didn’t realise how precious that way of life was until I read your book. I’ve lived all these years, yet it was someone much younger than me—Tamaki—who made me realise it. My daughter is an academic, so she can be a bit rigid in her thinking, but she’s also a big fan of yours. I bought her one of your dresses the other day, and whenever she goes out, that’s the outfit she always chooses to wear. I want her to read this book too. She teaches at a university, and I hope she’ll be able to share these ideas with her students.

Tamaki: That would be wonderful…

Participant I: Reading this book made me realise that my childhood experiences were an incredible treasure. To be honest,I used to feel embarrassed about growing up in the countryside, so I rarely talked about it. But now I’m proud of it. I feel that maybe Ms Tamaki is helping bring back the best parts of what Japan once was.

Tamaki: Are you saying it’s okay for me to do that? Then I’ll definitely be riding that horse around town!

Participant I: I can’t express it as eloquently as Mr Omori can, but because I’ve actually lived through those experiences, I understand them instinctively. You write in the book that you didn’t understand these things through words—you understood them through feeling. I was the same way as a child. At some point, I started translating everything into words. Reading this book made me wish we could return to that kind of time.

Tamaki: Apparently, the years before a child turns four are especially important. We recently held a talk here with Ms Midori Takiguchi, who moved to Taka Town. It was about raising children, and she shared so many eye-opening insights. It really made me feel that much of today’s education has gone in the wrong direction. As tamaki niime looks toward creating even better work and welcoming great new staff, I’ve been thinking about what kind of people we should be looking for. She said the single most important factor is how much freedom a child had before the age of four—how much time they were allowed to spend freely without constant parental interference. She said the more opportunities children have to experience a day where they have nothing scheduled and are simply left to explore on their own, the better.

Participant I: I think I had that kind of childhood. There were so many children back then.

Tamaki: Exactly. There were so many children that it happened naturally. There weren’t any daycare centres, and kids simply spent their days together. Their parents were busy working in the fields and rice paddies, so children formed their own communities and spent the whole day together. They were free to do whatever they wanted. They had endless time to immerse themselves in whatever interested them, so they naturally discovered what they were good at. Of course they failed sometimes, but they could keep trying, learning, and improving. They also realised, ‘I’m just not good at this,’ and gradually spent more and more time doing the things they truly enjoyed. If you can help a child become deeply absorbed in something by the age of four, then, they say, you hardly have to teach them anything after that.

Participant I: But nowadays there are so many dangers. How can we…?

Tamaki: Weren’t things actually more dangerous back then?

Participant I: …I remember getting lost in the mountains.

Omori: Now that I think about it, when I was three years old, I used to walk around the busy streets in front of Nishiwaki Station by myself. I was only three. I clearly remember my parents giving me a 100-yen coin and sending me to Marue to buy something. I know it happened because I remember there was a toy store called Temple next to Marue back then. That would have been around 1979.

Tamaki: That’s why I think today’s world is simply overprotective. Of course, crimes happen, and nothing in this world is ever completely safe. That hasn’t changed since the old days. It’s like removing playground equipment from parks so children won’t get hurt. But children are supposed to get hurt sometimes. We keep removing every possible risk so that no one gets injured, and as a result, life becomes less enjoyable. We lose our sense of adventure. Yet we only truly learn through failure. Instead, we try to raise children so that they never fail. Then, even as adults, they can’t make decisions on their own. They end up thinking, ‘I don’t know what to do unless my parents decide for me.’ What I’d really like children to discover isn’t simply what they like or dislike, but what they’re naturally suited to, what genuinely interests them. And another goal of mine is to increase Japan’s birthrate.

Participant I: I often look after my young grandchildren, so this is incredibly helpful.

Tamaki: You really don’t need to interfere with them so much. If they’re deeply interested in something, just let them keep doing it. Don’t interrupt them just because it’s time to move on to the next activity. Parents shouldn’t decide everything. Just leave them alone. Let them have a little adventure. I recently learned that babies don’t simply crawl off the edge of a porch. They instinctively know how to avoid falling. They feel the edge with their hands, turn around, and climb down backwards. They naturally have that ability. But because parents step in too quickly, children never learn to do these things for themselves. Ironically, that can make them more prone to getting hurt later in life. The more parents interfere, the less children grow. In the end, parents should do as little as possible. I really think that’s the heart of it. Personally, I’d love to see families having five or more children.

Koshikawa: So the birthrate in niime Village should keep climbing. (laughs)

Tamaki: Exactly! That’s why I’ve been thinking about ways to reward people for having children. If I were mayor, I’d give every family five million yen for each child. Don’t you think five million yen per child would be a good idea?

Omori: This book also talks about education. The problem with modern parenting is that it ignores the process and focuses only on results. Entrance exams are a good example. Real growth comes through repeating failures and successes, and the genuine results emerge from that process. But parents don’t trust the process, and neither do the education system or the government. Everything is planned backward from the desired outcome because no one wants to be held responsible if something goes wrong. tamaki niime takes the opposite approach. It says, ‘Let’s learn through making mistakes.’ The book is really about the importance of the process. In that sense, it’s actually a book about education.

Tamaki: Yes! It’s an education book! (laughs) I really think these ideas are just common sense, but somehow what should be common sense no longer is, and that’s such a shame. Ideally, your work should be something that brings you joy, and even better if it also brings happiness to as many other people as possible. Even if I keep creating until the day I die, my time will eventually come to an end. That’s why I want the next generation to continue making things with excitement and curiosity. My only wish is to keep wearing clothes that make me feel good for the rest of my life. (laughs) So I’d like younger people to be the ones creating them. It’s just like a home-cooked meal made by a parent. Things created with genuine care and heart have a warmth and comfort that you can truly feel. I hope that spirit of craftsmanship will spread—not only through clothing, but also through community building and nurturing people—and that the circle of people sharing those values will continue to grow. That’s why I created this book. I hope all of you will pick it up and give it a read.

Original Japanese text by Seiji Koshikawa.
English translation by Adam & Michiko Whipple.