How are chopsticks born?

It has been more than a decade since I first began visiting the workshop of wooden chopstick craftsman Mr. Masayoshi Yamada. Even now, whenever new staff join Ginza Natsuno, I take them along to visit Mr. Yamada—both as part of their training and as a way to learn directly from the source.

How does a single pair of chopsticks come into being?

How does a master craftsman face the work of making chopsticks?

Visiting Mr. Yamada’s factory is a rare opportunity to witness, up close, the way traditional wooden chopstick making is carried forward into the present day. For this feature, I asked Mr. Yamada for a special favor: to show us the entire process in one continuous flow. Every time I visit, I am struck anew by how many human “hands” it takes to complete just one pair of chopsticks.

A craftsman of one path—50 years

First, a brief introduction. Until the previous generation, the Yamada family workshop was based in Tokyo. In Mr. Yamada’s generation, they established what is now Yamada Chopsticks Workshop in Misato Town, Kodama District, Saitama Prefecture.

“My father and mother were both chopstick craftsmen, but my father didn’t really teach me anything,” Mr. Yamada said with a smile. “He was the old-fashioned type—‘learn by watching.’”

Mr. Yamada was born in 1944. He is a craftsman who has devoted himself to chopsticks for 50 years.

“When I was young, I could make about 1,500 pairs a day. But things aren’t like they used to be—there are more processes now. I probably don’t even reach two-thirds of what I did back then. On average, it’s about 35,000 to 36,000 pairs a year.”

He said it casually, but even by a conservative estimate, 36,000 pairs per year over 50 years amounts to roughly 1.8 million pairs of chopsticks.

A skilled craftsman works fast—this has never changed.

Watching Mr. Yamada at work, his movements are crisp and rhythmic. And as he gets into the flow, every unnecessary motion disappears. You can’t help but wonder how much faster he could become.

It begins with a log

One defining feature of Mr. Yamada’s chopstick making is that it “starts from a log.”

Typically, many makers begin with lumber already cut into boards—often called ōwari (large splits)—or even with materials closer to chopstick shape, called kowari (small splits). Put simply, many craftsmen specialize mainly in the finishing stages.

Mr. Yamada, however, starts by sawing a log into blocks, then cutting those blocks into boards (ōwari). Craftsmen who can handle the work from the log stage—creating ōwari themselves—are rare, even across Japan.

“Be careful—it can kick back,” he warned as he began cutting an exceptional material called aogurotan (“blue-black ebony”).

In the world of chopsticks, it has recently become common to hear that “good aokoku is hard to obtain.” It is a particularly special wood. Strictly speaking, what is scarce is good aokoku already prepared as small splits. With the skills to purchase logs and cut them appropriately while reading the grain, as Mr. Yamada does, it becomes possible to create superb blue-black ebony chopsticks.

Reading the flow of water inside the wood

Next, Mr. Yamada began cutting a wood called Onoorekanba (Japanese hornbeam). This marked the start of the kowari work.

To an untrained eye, he seemed to simply cut material one after another in a steady rhythm. But from time to time, he would subtly change the orientation of the wood—making quick judgments while cutting.

When his hands paused for a moment, I asked, “Is it the grain?”

“Yes—and the vessels,” he replied.

These “vessels” are the channels that carry water and nutrients upward through the tree. When you look at the cut material, you can see lines that run differently from the grain—these vessels. Over time, they affect whether chopsticks are likely to snap or not, and whether they will warp or stay straight.

“The grain runs this way, see? And the vessels run this way. From here it gets thinner, and from here it gets thicker—” Mr. Yamada explained carefully, showing how the wood should be cut.

While we were slowly tracing each line with our eyes, Mr. Yamada was working just millimeters away from a blade spinning at 3,500 revolutions per minute—instantly watching both the grain and the vessels, feeding the wood into the blade without hesitation.

Mr. Yamada entered this world at age 16, and began sawing timber after he turned 20. Still working steadily, he said simply:

“Every piece of wood is different.”

A warm form, shaped by the hand

After ōwari and kowari, the next stage is shaping—“carving”—using sandpaper.

In this process, each chopstick is shaped one by one using a grinder. Handle shapes vary: square (with a fuller midsection), pentagonal, hexagonal, and more. Whether the profile has four sides or eight, and including the delicate tips, Mr. Yamada relies on the sensitivity he has cultivated over decades to shape the final form.

When you hold a finished piece in your hand, you can feel a warmth that is unmistakably the result of handwork.

Next comes a process called gara-gake, which smooths the entire surface. This is one of the defining characteristics of wooden chopsticks that are not finished with lacquer or other coatings.

Using a simple machine, the chopsticks are polished with water and sand. Thanks to this gara-gake, the surface becomes remarkably smooth—almost pleasingly slick to the touch.

With help from the sun

After gara-gake, the chopsticks are sun-dried. The factory roof serves as the drying space, and as many as 6,000 pairs are lined up across the entire rooftop.

This drying is not primarily about “drying,” but rather about “selection.”

“At this stage, any chopsticks that show warping are all removed,” Mr. Yamada explained. “Especially on bright, scorching days, the ones that warp will warp dramatically. Those can’t be sold.”

While mass-produced, industrial-style chopsticks may be force-dried quickly by machines, Mr. Yamada relies on sunlight and time—drying carefully, and checking the quality of the material with his own eyes, one by one.

When he was sawing wood, “reading the wood” was already a vital part of the craftsman’s work. In sun-drying as well, “watching the wood” becomes an essential act.

Mr. Yamada’s attitude toward the material is always deeply sincere.

Competing with the wood itself

The final step is buffing. For lacquered chopsticks, additional processes follow, but on this day he was making traditional, uncoated wooden chopsticks. He finished them by polishing with naturally derived carnauba wax.

The defining feature of wooden chopsticks is that they do not rely on lacquer or decoration—they compete with the wood itself. That is why the wood matters so much, and why neither form nor touch can be faked. In that sense, these chopsticks reveal the maker’s skill and spirit directly and without distortion.

Behind the factory, there is a towering pile of wood pieces that—unfortunately—could not become chopsticks. On cold days, they are stacked as firewood for the stove. Among them, you can even find pieces that would be called fine, precious timber, lying casually here and there.

Seeing that mountain of wood makes you feel, keenly, the value of the pair of chopsticks in your hand.

Mr. Yamada’s dignified stance as a wooden chopstick craftsman—never treating even “one pair out of 1.8 million” carelessly—feels as if it is quietly told by those wood pieces that could not become chopsticks.