Traditional craft
Kyo Nui
京繍
Kyoto's elegant silk and gold embroidery, which began in the workshops of the Heian court and still decorates the floats of the Gion Matsuri.
Key facts
- Officially recognised
- 15 December 1976
- Type
- Other textile crafts
- Region
- Kansai
- Official name in Japanese
- 京繍
- Official area (in Japanese)
- 京都市、宇治市
Heian elegance in thread
Kyo Nui is embroidery in silk and gold and silver thread on silk or hemp cloth, using advanced techniques passed down for centuries. It carries the graceful style of the Heian court. It is made in Kyoto city and Uji in Kyoto, on kimono, haori, banners and stage curtains.
Thirty stitches
There are about 30 Kyo Nui techniques in use today. Fifteen are basic, including nuikiri, koma-zukai (couching gold thread), sashi-nui, kusari-nui (chain stitch), sagara-nui (knot stitch) and kumihimo-nui, which imitates braided cord.
Court workshop to merchant fashion
When the Heian capital was built in Kyoto, the court set up a workshop office, the Oribe-no-tsukasa, with its own embroiderers. Until yuzen dyeing was perfected in the mid-Edo period, embroidery, along with Kyo Kanoko Shibori and gold leaf, was one of the main ways to decorate cloth. It played a key part in the bold Kanbun-style designs of wealthy merchants, and an embroidered cloth from that era is kept at Konbuin temple in Nara.
Good to know
- Visit Kyoto during the Gion Matsuri in July: on the evenings before the float procession, the float neighbourhoods display their embroidered hangings.
- Look closely at the gold thread; in couching, it is laid on the surface and held down by fine silk stitches.
Questions travellers ask
Where can I see Kyo Nui?
On kimono and banners, and on the hangings of the Gion Matsuri floats, displayed in the float neighbourhoods during the festival.
How many Kyo Nui techniques are there?
About 30 are used today, 15 of them basic.
Where it comes from
More crafts from the same area
Heritage stories from the same area
- 800 years of Japanese tea in Uji and southern Kyoto
- Kitamaebune: the merchant ships that made Japan's port towns rich
- Lake Biwa Canal: the waterway of hope from Otsu to Kyoto
- Saigoku 33 Kannon Pilgrimage: Japan's 1,300-year journey of the heart
- Tango chirimen: 300 years of silk on Kyoto's north coast
- Yokosuka, Kure, Sasebo and Maizuru: Japan's naval port cities
Sources
We checked the facts on this page against these sources.