Sketchplanations

Get my new weekly sketch in your inbox

Join over 30,000 people learning something new in a moment each Sunday.

Kintsugi: A bowl repaired with kintsugi with bright gold seams visible next to a flower

Kintsugi

Kintsugi is the repair of a ceramic item, perhaps a bowl or vase, with a bright gold seam. Like wabi sabi, kintsugi reflects a view that wear and use of an object adds value rather than detracts. Rather than try to hide the past damage and the repair instead it is celebrated and enhanced. A bowl repaired with kintsugi might be seen as more valuable than one that had never been broken.

An ebook might reload the same every time. A book, instead, accumulates its previous use in its pages and appearance — the slight bend in the pages, discoloration from fingerprints or sunlight, creases in the spine at frequently visited pages, a pencil mark here and there. The book itself hints at the story of its own life. A well-thumbed secondhand book can be a beautiful thing.

You may have noticed some modern kintsugi in Kylo Ren's helmet.

You’re welcome to use and share this image and text for non-commercial purposes with attribution. Go wild!
See licence

Buy Me A Coffee