Japanese Stationery FAQ
What’s so special about Japanese stationery?
There are stationery items made in Japan that just wouldn’t come from anywhere else. Super fine pens, luxuriously decorated fountain pens, super-thin paper that works perfectly with fountain pens, the cutest designs, and more.
It would probably take far more expert minds than ours to really explain why, but there are a combination of factors in Japan that probably help. There’s a culture of craftsmanship, often learned over decades, with people dedicating their lives to doing one craft to perfection. There’s the ‘Kaizen’ culture of continuous improvement. The ‘Kawaii’ culture of cuteness. The Kanji writing system that benefits from fine-tipped pens and brush pens. And a determination to manufacture things to the very highest standards.
It’s also a culture that developed less connected to most of the world, which just makes things more different.
Isn’t most of the stationery in the big shops Japanese?
Well, yes, a lot of it is. We all know Pilot and Uni-ball pens. A pretty large percentage of the gel pens and rollerballs we see around come from Japan. But there’s a *vast* array of stationery from Japan that we don’t see as often, if ever, outside Japan. And much of it is *very* different from anything you’d see at a big stationery shop in the UK or the USA.
What does ‘Kawaii’ mean?
Cute, basically. Cute, in that very Japanese way. Hello Kitty is kawaii. A Japanese schoolgirl sneezing is kawaii. Kittens, erasers in the shape of piggies, pink fluffy animé characters. That sort of thing. Modern Japanese culture is a bit obsessed with kawaii things.
Oh, and the extra ‘i’ at the end is pronounced separately, like ‘ka-why-ee’.
