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This is quite amazing, also because I do not know how it could happen that our paths did not cross before.

Steve Beimel is a Californian guy living in Kyoto for some 50 years. He is leading a project that has been on my wishlist for years: making traditional crafts shine. It is not just a matter of saving, preserving or protecting. Beautiful things have the inner power to shine, and Steve is master in giving them right push into the limelight.

As the famous Mendelhsson quote recites: “tradition is the tendering of the fire, not the worship of the ashes”.

And definitely Steve knows the path as well as walks the path.

He ran a customized experiences travel agency for foreign tourists in search for the true japan but just before Covid he shifted full time to the https://www.japancraft21.com/ project.

I think I cannot describe his aim and mission as well as he does, so I would like to encourage those interested to get in touch with him directly.

Let me just say one thing: not only he is generously supporting talented craftsmen and renovating a gorgeous machiya but taking advantage of new regulations in the japan building standard law, he is taking the lead in building from scratch the first Machiya in 80 years!

see here for a Google photos album

I have the feeling that the two of us will find many projects to cooperate on, and you will learn a lot about him here in the future. But the bridging of the traditional knowledge to the new generations cannot wait, so I decided to share his info with the Bartok community with the hope that you also could find your personal projects to develop together with Steve.