[Sebastián Urresti]

Hi folks!
Doug, my english wasn´t good enough to understand the procces that you´ve explain in your message, I´m sorry! Is this one that I´m posting?
I will try to make a draw of a japanese kumihimo traditional finishing to send you latter, but here is a whipping that can be made to form a tassel with the "unbraided" (is that correct?) threads.
Important: If you want to cut the threads to form the "tassel" wrap it with a paper, then cut it. You can steam the threads and "comb" it. If you work with two color you can separate them in the tassel.


Hughs,
Sebas

[Doug Sanders]

Thanks- that's very similar to what I'm doing now. The paper wrapping and cutting trick was known also. I must have similar books to yours.

[Janel]

I remember that technique from macrame in the early 1970's !

[Sebastián Urresti]

Hey Janel, any idea about another Kumihimo finishing? Macrame is great, I think that is knot in turkish, maybe Ekrem can help us here
There´s also a way that a braid can have only one tassel and is by placing what you want to braid in the middle of the threads (side by side with nthe counter-weght) and braid the desired lenght.
Hughs,
Sebas

[Janel]

I have not learned to do kumihimo, though I experimented long ago with an oatmeal box and string. The cord used with netsuke... sagemono, The cord ends are knotted and inserted into the himotoshi of the netsuke, so no tassel is required for that use. Sorry, no help from me with about that.

[Doug Sanders]

you're right, but the cord still needs to be ended in a way that will stop fraying. A four-bobbin braid in silk unravels very easily

[Janel]

Even when the knot is stuck in a hole?

[Doug Sanders]

Yeah- I guess you do have a point. While the cord is knotted and recessed in a himotoshi (hole) I doubt it would fray.
I guess I was approaching it from the direction that the cord was purchased and/or cut at some point before it was tied to a netsuke. Wouldn't it fray at this point? or when the netsuke is changed and the cord is used for another?
(hypothetically speaking smiley)

[Sebastián Urresti]

If you don´t fast, tie, burn and melt or stitch the end of any kumihimo braid the "unravelling" process will happen...
((Sorry about my ingnorance but the himitoshi have a small hole and a big hole, are the holes united? if so, the big hole hides a knot? Or, why is it bigger? ))
I´ve never seen an inro or a netsuke, but for what I´ve seen the braid is a Maru Yatsu (four plait braid) and the unravel is FAST!

[Doug Sanders]

You are correct; the consensus is that the larger hole provides a recess in which the knot can sit. Most, if not all inro/netsuke cords I've seen are either a four or eight plait braid. Nothing very fancy compared to other uses of cords in Japan e.g in accordance with the wearing and mounting of swords, obijime, and armor lacing.

[Doug Sanders]

I visited my local art museum last night as they've opened a new Asian Art wing. They had a drawer full of inro, so I took a look at the cords running through them. As odd as it seems to me, virtually none of them had their ends finished to prevent fraying. Consequently, fraying occurred to the length of about a centimeter on some. With these being art objects and in storage or on display most of their lives the fraying situation is kept in check. If they were worn or handled more often, I could see problems happening.

Those whose ends were finished had the wrapping as is posted at the start of this thread.

[Sebastián Urresti]

Hi Doug!
Must be great to have a Museum like that near home... Thanks for the description.
It means that we are in the right path

[Janel]

Do we know an antiquities specialist who would know the answer from Japanese history of inro/netsuke, about whether or knot the ends were controlled... Oh the ends of the cord with the inro both end up at the himotoshi don't they?