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Kintsugi, or golden joinery, is usually traced to the late 15th century shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa, who sent a damaged Chinese tea bowl back to China for repair. It returned held together with metal staples, a respected technique also used in ancient Greece, England, Russia and South America. Rather than reject it, Japanese observers saw a large insect clinging to the bowl and nicknamed it Bakohan, large locust clamp. Craftsmen then began bonding breaks with urushi lacquer dusted with powdered gold, silver or platinum, and some collectors were accused of smashing pottery on purpose to get the look.

The episode connects the craft to wabi-sabi, mushin, mono no aware and mottainai, then details the materials and process. Urushi contains urushiol, the compound in poison ivy, and cures by polymerization in a humid chamber called a furo at about 90% humidity for two days to two weeks. It explains the crack, piece and joint-call styles, yobitsugi and tomotsugi, and modern uses by Charlotte Bailey, Karen LaMonte, Pokemon designers and Victor Solomon’s 2020 Kintsugi Court in Los Angeles.

• Mugi urushi, half lacquer and half wheat flour, uses gluten to make a sticky structural adhesive.
• Sabi urushi mixes lacquer with two kinds of fine clay to fill chips and missing volume.
• Modern curing setups include cardboard boxes or burying mended pieces in damp rice, beans or wet sand.
• Karen LaMonte repaired monumental ceramic dress sculptures with gold after a kiln explosion.
• Victor Solomon filled the cracks of a South LA basketball court with gold-dusted resin to mark the NBA’s restart during COVID-19.