2010-03-21

お陰様市場

March 6-8 and 17-21 built the plastered straw bale interior of a store that will sell organic produce and fair trade goods. The name of the store is お陰様市場(okagesama-ichiba), which means something like "Thanksgiving Market". The store will function as another aspect of Cafe Slow, an organic cafe in Tokyo that acts as a hub for several environmental and social movements, both domestic and international. In May of 2008, I led the construction of Cafe Slow's straw bale interior. Both the May, 2008 Cafe Slow building project and this project are renovations of existing buildings.
March 6-7 we hosted a straw bale raising workshop. The plastered bales are used mainly aesthetically as opposed to structurally. March 17-19 we hosted a small plastering workshop.
March 20 and 21 applied the finish plaster.
The floor was plastered by a professional plasterer in Tokyo. For further details and photos, please see the Cafe Slow blog