About Sori Yanagi

Sori Yanagi is one of the most important designers, not only in Japan but also from an international point of view. His emblematic creation, the "Butterfly" stool, is one of the most iconic works in the world.

The butterfly stool:

Studying art and architecture together at the Tokyo Art School from 1934, he  became Charlotte Perriand's assistant between 1940 and 1942, during her trip to Japan.

if this trip considerably influenced her work, it also left its mark on a whole generation of Japanese designers. Thus, Sori Yanagi had a front row seat to discover European Modernism and the reflections on industrial design. As early as 1947, he studied industrial design and won the first prize in the Japanese Industrial Design Competition, finally creating the Yanagi Industrial Design Institute in 1952. Son of Sōetsu Yanagi, founder of the Mingei movement which celebrates the ancestral Japanese know-how and the beauty of everyday objects, Sori Yanagi puts a lot of emphasis on craftsmanship, creating a rich and two-faced design.

In 1954, he created his two most emblematic pieces, the "Elephant" and "Butterfly" stools. A true poetic materialization of the encounter between East and West, the latter is exemplary in more than one way: designed using the curved plywood technique, its two butterfly-like leaves - from which it takes its name - are connected by a simple brass rod. This type of seat did not exist in Japanese culture: western in its function, its shape is a tribute to Japanese craftman art, recalling both ideograms and torii, the portals marking the entrance to Shinto shrines. Simple and organic in form, it is a hybrid work, the union of industrial design and Japanese craft tradition.

Sori Yanagi is one of the most influential and prolific designers of his time: he became director of the Tokyo Museum of Folk Art in 1977. He created furniture, lighting, toys, tableware, cars, motorcycles, but also a tape recorder for the Sony company, or even subway stations. Versatile and versatile, he was entrusted with the creation of the Olympic Torch for the Tokyo Summer Olympics in 1964: a consecration for this designer, he also revealed to the world the vitality of modern Japanese design.
A polymorphous designer, deeply imbued with the philosophy of Le Corbusier, he is one of the most important designers of the post-war period.

It's time to introduce our Sori Yanagi kitchenware collection with emblematic pieces like kettles and everyday 's kitchen tools.