Japanese Bookbinding

Kojiro Ikegami, third generation in a line of professional bookbinders, is one of the few full-time practitioners of the craft in Japan. He has repaired innumerable antiquarian books, many designated as national treasures or important cultural properties, at his workshop in the Tokyo National Museum. In 1979 he received a distinguished government award—the Sixth Class Order of the Rising Sun—for his contribution to the conservation of significant books in Japan's history. Recently retired, he is succeeded by his son Yukio, who continues the family profession at the museum workshop and at their home studio in Tokyo.