59 stores · curated ORBIS register
Bedouin geometric weaving is the focus at Al Sadu Society (Sadu House), where a shop accompanies the library and workshop programme. The Kuwait organisation began in 1980 inside a residence built in 1936, selling textiles made with those weaving techniques. Tokushima's Awa Yuzen Kojo works with indigo dyeing and yūzen, with an Aizome Kogeikan shop attached to its craft activity. Bagan House Artistic Lacquerware uses needle-etched yun-de decoration in its lacquerware, continuing a Bagan workshop history that began in 1930.
Kuwait City, Kuwait
Sadu House has operated inside a 1936 courtyard residence since 1980, preserving the geometric loom-weaving of Kuwait's Bedouin communities through workshops, a research library, and a small retail shop. Purchases there support weavers directly, since the textiles sold are made with the same techniques the house exists to document.
Best for Handwoven Sadu textiles and Bedouin weaving heritage goods
Tokushima / Japan
Awa Yuzen Kojo has dyed textiles in Tokushima's traditional indigo since 1907, developing its own aizome techniques alongside its founding yuzen dyeing craft. The workshop's onsite Aizome Kogeikan shop sells finished indigo goods daily and runs reservation-only dyeing workshops for visitors.
Best for Traditional Tokushima indigo aizome and yuzen-dyed textiles, plus reservation-only dyeing workshops
New Bagan, Mandalay Region
Founded in 1930 by U Pho Guang under the name Saya Gaung, whose lacquer caskets are held in the British Museum, Bagan House is now run by fourth-generation owner Ma Maw in New Bagan. Artisans hand-etch yun-de lacquerware using the needle technique Pan Yun.
Best for Hand-etched yun-de lacquerware from a fourth-generation family workshop
Bagan House's own history page dates the business to 1930, when it was founded by U Pho Guang under the name Saya Gaung during the British colonial period. Lacquer caskets bearing that original Saya Gaung name have survived into museum and private collections, including the British Museum, giving the workshop's early output a documented trail independent of its own marketing.
Ownership has passed down four generations: from U Pho Guang to his daughter Daw Wei, who sold lacquerware traveling to the Shan states; then to U Tint Aung, who worked as a production manager at a government lacquerware institute and studied at the Wajima Lacquerware School in Japan between 1969 and 1971; and finally to the current owner, Ma Maw, in New Bagan.
The workshop produces yun-de, Burmese lacquerware made from the sap of the Melanorrhoea usitata tree, decorating pieces using Pan Yun, a needle-etching technique applied by hand. A single well-made piece can take three to six months to complete, reflecting Bagan's broader standing as one of Myanmar's two main lacquerware production centers alongside the craft's roots reaching back centuries in the region.
Sorrento / Online
Biagio Barile Store sells handcrafted Sorrento inlaid woodwork -- boxes, trays, mirrors, and music boxes -- made by a small family workshop practicing the craft since 1920. The online shop ships internationally and also offers reseller partnerships.
Best for Handcrafted Sorrento inlaid woodwork -- boxes, trays, mirrors
Gelsted (near Copenhagen)
Hans J. Wegner's workshop — the exclusive manufacturer of Wegner's Wishbone Chair (Y-stolen), Shell Chair, and other mid-century Danish classics. Handcrafted in oak, walnut, and cherry since 1908.
Best for The Wishbone Chair, the Wegner classics, and the handcrafted quality.
Barcelona / Spain
Casa Piera opened in 1941, when Vicente Piera Amat and Conchita Domènech Casas took a 60-square-metre shop on Carrer Cardenal Casañas, just off Plaza del Pi in central Barcelona, and began selling to the city's artists, artisans and art students.
Best for Fine-art and design materials from a family-run Barcelona shop trading since 1941
Casa Piera opened in 1941, when Vicente Piera Amat and Conchita Domènech Casas took a 60-square-metre shop on Carrer Cardenal Casañas, just off Plaza del Pi in central Barcelona, and began selling to the city's artists, artisans and art students. The business grew from that single small storefront into a business with locations in Sant Cugat and Vic as well as Barcelona, before consolidating its main premises in 2014 at Carrer del Pintor Fortuny, 21 — a 650-square-metre space large enough to give customers room to exhibit their own work alongside the shop's stock.
The present-day range covers the working needs of painters, illustrators and designers alike: oil, acrylic, watercolour, gouache and tempera paint; pencils, charcoal, pastels and markers; papers and sketchbooks; brushes and palette knives; canvas and stretchers; printmaking tools; and art-instruction books, alongside supplies for design, illustration and school use.
Eighty-plus years on from a couple opening a small shop off the Plaza del Pi, Casa Piera is still a family-founded business trading a few streets from its original address, now serving Barcelona's professional and student artists from a space built specifically to make room for their work.
Oregon, USA
Portland boot authority since 1932 — the Mountain Light, Gore-Tex pioneer and USA-made recraftable icons.
Best for Mountain Light, hiking boots
London, UK
London luxury sleepwear — handmade pajamas, robes, and gowns in silk and fine cotton since 1926.
Best for Cotton pyjamas, silk robes and serious loungewear
Derek Rose operates as a London-based luxury sleepwear and loungewear maker with a heritage spanning nearly a century. The brand specializes in handcrafted pajamas, nightgowns, robes, and leisurewear produced in England using premium materials including silk and fine cottons. The company emphasizes meticulous tailoring, comfort construction, and fabric quality. Derek Rose positions itself in the luxury segment, with pieces designed for evening wear and special occasions as well as everyday sleepwear. The brand maintains a direct retail presence in London and sells through their online platform.
Sheffield / United Kingdom
Ernest Wright has hand-forged scissors and shears at its Kutrite Works in central Sheffield since 1902, an endangered craft recognized with the Heritage Crafts Association's inaugural President's Award. Every pair is made to order and sold through the company's own online shop.
Best for Scissors, Shears, Sheffield steel
Fort Mason Center, 2 Marina Boulevard, Building D, San Francisco, CA 94123, United States / San Francisco / United States
First San Francisco Flax shop opened in 1938 at 437 Kearny Street; the Fort Mason shop opened November 2015 and became the remaining SF door after the Market Street flagship left for Oakland.
Best for A Fort Mason shop descended from a San Francisco store opened in 1938.
Ortisei / Italy / Online
Franco is a Val Gardena woodcarving manufactory active since 1929, whose local artisans hand-carve and hand-paint madonnas, nativity scenes, angels, crucifixes and secular pieces from alpine wood. Every carving from its own workshop is sold through the Franco online shop and its physical shop in Ortisei.
Best for Woodcarving, sculptures, nativities, crucifixes, religious art
Kanazawa, Ishikawa, Japan
Gold Leaf Sakuda has manufactured and applied gold and silver leaf in Kanazawa since 1919, evolving from a leaf wholesaler into a maker of gilded folding screens and craft goods. Near the Higashi Chaya district, the company runs a factory tour, a small gold-leaf museum, and hands-on gilding workshops alongside its retail shop.
Best for Gold leaf workshops and gilded folding screens
Higashi Chaya District, Kanazawa
A gold-leaf manufacturer and retail shop selling craft objects and offering demonstrations of traditional gold-leaf production. Established 1919.
Best for Gold-leaf craft objects and live production demonstrations, since 1919.
Varanasi
HMR Handlooms, a master-weaver enterprise established in 1930 rooted in the weaving lanes of Banaras, works hand in hand with skilled artisan families to hand-weave 100% pure silk Banarasi sarees on traditional looms, with weaving taking 15 days to 6 months depending on design. It is Silk Mark Certified and Handloom Assured, with its main store at MS Plaza, Rathyatra Crossing, Varanasi.
Best for Hand-woven pure silk Banarasi sarees
Escolta, Manila
Maker-led retail in Manila's First United Building (Andrés Luna de San Pedro, 1928), grown from artist pop-up markets after the owners opened vacant rooms to creatives.
Best for Maker-led retail and community space in historic Escolta
Takamatsu / Japan
Ichiwado Kogei has made Kagawa lacquerware since its founding in 1917, when its founder trained in the Yamanaka lacquerware district of Ishikawa before opening a Takamatsu shop that relocated to Yashima after the war. The workshop applies traditional zokoku-nuri and goto-nuri finishes alongside brighter, contemporary color-lacquer designs.
Best for Kagawa lacquerware in zokoku-nuri and goto-nuri finishes, founded 1917
Ichiwado Kogei was founded in June 1917 (Taisho 6) and has made Kagawa lacquerware for over a century from what is now its workshop in the Yashima district of Takamatsu. Regional press coverage traces the founder's training to the Yamanaka lacquerware area of Ishikawa Prefecture, a separate, older lacquer-producing region, before he returned to open a shop in central Takamatsu; the business relocated to Yashima after the Second World War.
The workshop's technique centers on two named Kagawa lacquerware finishes: zokoku-nuri and goto-nuri, both historic styles associated with the prefecture's craft tradition. Alongside pieces in these established finishes, Ichiwado Kogei also produces work in brighter, contemporary color lacquers and grain-forward wood finishes, positioning itself as making 'casual vessels accessible to younger generations' as well as gift-oriented collections.
The current workshop operates from Yashima Higashi-cho in Takamatsu, closed Sundays and holidays, and sells both from the physical shop and its own online store.
Ikuji, Kurobe, Toyama, Japan
Founded in 1927 in the fishing port of Ikuji, this maker steams and grills kamaboko fish cakes from Toyama Bay catch, including white shrimp and other local seafood. The company still runs its workshop and retail shop in the harbor district it was named for, alongside an online store at ikujikamaboko.com for its gift boxes.
Best for Toyama-style kamaboko fish cakes and gift sets
Heizo-machi, Gotō City (Fukue Island), Nagasaki
Imamura Tsubaki Seiyusho has pressed camellia oil on Fukue Island since 1933 using the tamashime first-press method, tending roughly four thousand trees for its seed. The family sells culinary and cosmetic camellia oil, shampoo and pressed-seed cake from its Heizo-machi workshop.
Best for First-press culinary and cosmetic camellia oil
Jakarta
Iwan Tirta Private Collection carries forward the house of Iwan Tirta (1935–2010), the Yale-trained lawyer turned designer who launched his label in 1973 after studying under royal batik makers of the Surakarta palace. His batik shirts were worn by heads of state at the 1994 APEC summit.
Best for Continuing batik maestro Iwan Tirta's royal-court-inspired Javanese batik legacy
Iwan Tirta, born Nusjirwan Tirtaamidjaja in Blora, Central Java, in 1935, trained first as a lawyer — earning a law degree from Yale in 1965 and later teaching at the University of Indonesia — before turning to batik preservation in the 1970s. He launched his own label in 1973, having researched and trained directly under royal batik makers connected to the Surakarta palace.
Tirta is credited with leading batik's design revival through the 1970s and 1980s, elevating a traditional craft into internationally recognized fashion. His work reached its highest public profile in 1994, when he designed the batik shirts worn by attending heads of state at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit held in Indonesia; his clients over the years included Nelson Mandela and Ronald Reagan.
Tirta died in 2010, and the Iwan Tirta Private Collection in Jakarta continues under his name, carrying his royal-court-derived motifs and design philosophy forward as a going concern rather than a museum-only archive.
Shimane / Japan
Izumo Mingei Shi has hand-pulled washi paper in the Yakumo hills since the workshop building went up in 1933, carrying on techniques championed by Living National Treasure Eishiro Abe. Visitors can watch papermaking in progress and buy sheets, cards, and craft paper through the studio's dedicated online shop.
Best for Craft - Washi Paper, Handmade Paper, Mingei
Casco antiguo, seville / Spain
Juan Foronda has handcrafted flamenco accessories from Calle Sierpes in Seville since 1923, specializing in hand- and machine-embroidered mantones (Manila shawls), mantillas, fans and bridal hair pieces. The family workshop, Foronda y Balbuena, ships its embroidered pieces worldwide through its online shop.
Best for Flamenco accessories, mantones, mantillas, hand embroidery
Kanazawa
Kaga embroidery workshop in Kanazawa founded in 1912 by Sutaro Imai; now run by his great-granddaughter Sachiko Yokoyama, a nationally recognized traditional craftsperson, producing hand-stitched silk, gold and silver thread work.
Best for Kaga embroidery craftsmanship since 1912
The Kaga embroidery workshop known today as Kaga-nui IMAI began in 1912 in Kanazawa, founded by Sutaro Imai as 'Nui no Imai.' The craft itself dates back further, transmitted from Kyoto in the early Muromachi period alongside Buddhist teachings and originally used for altar decoration, using silk, gold and silver thread worked by hand into three-dimensional designs that cannot be replicated by machine. The workshop passed through a second-generation head, Fukueda, and a third, Kiyoshi, before reaching its current representative, Sachiko Yokoyama, the founder's great-granddaughter. Yokoyama was designated a National Traditional Craftsperson in 2008 and established the current Kaga-nui IMAI studio in 2011, continuing production of traditional pieces alongside newer, contemporary-facing designs.
Nakatsu, Kita-ku, Osaka
Kamoi Kakoshi has made adhesive tape in Okayama since 1923, starting with flypaper and moving to industrial masking tape. The mt line began when three women asked the factory for masking tape in colour. The first run used twenty traditional Japanese colours, and the catalogue has since passed a thousand designs on washi paper. The mt lab. shop in Osaka sits at Nakatsu in Kita ward.
Best for Original mt washi masking tape in a thousand colours and patterns.
Kamoi Kakoshi was founded in Okayama in 1923 and began by making flypaper. The company moved into industrial and painting masking tapes and ran for decades as a factory devoted to them. The mt line started with a book. Three women who had fallen for masking tape made a small volume of it, and their request for colourful tapes led the factory to develop mt. The first run used twenty traditional Japanese colours. Later tapes took up the wamon patterns, among them hemp leaf, twisted plum, hanabishi, kumikikkou. The catalogue has since passed a thousand separate designs. The paper is washi, thin enough to tear by hand and strong enough not to split, with an adhesive that lifts without residue. Printing is the other half of the work. The factory has taken on flocking, screen printing, foil stamping, pearl inks, fluorescent inks, double-sided printing, and has added wax paper, perforation, blackboard finishes. Collaborations run to illustrators, painters, picture-book makers, and to the textile house mina perhonen. The tapes and the exhibitions built from them have collected a Good Design Award, D and AD pencils and a Cannes Lions gold. The mt lab. shop in Osaka stands at Nakatsu in Kita ward. The factory tour at Kurashiki draws about fourteen thousand visitors each year.
al. Krasińskiego 23, Kraków
Founded in 1902, this family-run workshop on aleja Krasińskiego produces stained-glass art. It designs new ecclesiastical and secular windows and restores historic glasswork, taking commissions alongside its adjoining museum.
Best for Commissioned stained glass and restoration
Kyoto / Online
Run by the Yoshioka Jin Shoten shibori workshop, which has produced shibori on the site since 1940, the Kyoto Shibori Museum opened in 2001 as Japan's only museum devoted specifically to shibori resist-dyeing. It pairs rotating exhibitions with a retail shop and hands-on dyeing classes.
Best for Japan's only shibori-specialist museum, with a shop and hands-on dyeing classes
The Kyoto Shibori Museum sits on ground where shibori has been produced continuously since 1940, under the Yoshioka Jin Shoten workshop. The museum itself opened in 2001, built specifically to showcase the technique, and describes itself as the only museum in Japan dedicated to shibori.
Exhibitions rotate several times a year, displaying finished works and the traditional tools used across the shibori process — the resist-dyeing method that produces shibori's characteristic bound, stitched or folded patterning. The museum has also begun exhibiting internationally, part of a stated effort to promote the technique beyond Japan.
Visitors can take a shibori class on-site, with class participants receiving free museum admission as part of the experience, and shop for shibori-dyed textiles and traditional tools both in the attached shop and through the museum's online store.
1356 Sherbrooke Street West, Montreal, QC H3G 1J1 / Montreal / Canada
Founded 1906 as the Canadian Guild of Crafts / Canadian Handicrafts Guild; Like a Local Guide treats buying handmade jewellery, sculpture, textiles and ceramics as the point of the visit.
Best for Handmade jewellery, sculpture, textiles and ceramics.
Datong
A heritage calligraphy-brush maker that also applies its handcraft expertise to cosmetic brushes. Founded in Fuzhou in 1917, the family enterprise moved to Taiwan in 1946 and is now led by the fourth generation.
Best for Handcrafted calligraphy and cosmetic brushes from a family enterprise founded in Fuzhou in 1917
France
French wellington-boot maker founded in Normandy in 1927 by engineer Claude Chamot; added a Casablanca, Morocco factory in 1949, taking the Le Chameau name; boots still handmade by a single bootmaker per pair.
Best for Hand-crafted French rubber boots; Iconic wellington boot; Leather-lined wellie
Le Chameau traces its origin to 1927, when Claude Chamot, an agricultural engineer, set up a rubber-boot workshop behind an agricultural supply store in Cherbourg, Normandy, aiming to build boots comfortable and durable enough for the farmers, hunters and fishermen who had complained about existing rubber footwear. In 1949 the company opened a second production site in Casablanca, Morocco, and it was at that point the brand adopted the name Le Chameau - French for 'the camel' - as a nod to the new North African factory. Manufacturing has continued in both France and Morocco since. The company's signature process has each pair of boots, notably its Chasseur model, handcrafted from start to finish by a single Maitre bottier using a proprietary natural rubber compound the brand calls Chamolux. Le Chameau has more recently taken on ceremonial and sporting associations in Britain, including as official boot partner of the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race.
Via Chiaia, Naples / Online
Naples textile house founded 1956 by Livio De Simone (b. 1920), whose hand-painted, water-dyed prints made him a fixture of 1960s-70s Capri fashion and a fabric collaborator of Emilio Pucci; now run by his daughter Benedetta.
Best for Hand-painted resort prints.
Livio De Simone was born in Naples in 1920 and left a career as a lawyer to pursue design, establishing his own factory in 1956. He showed collections at Palazzo Pitti in Florence and dressed film figures including Audrey Hepburn and Elsa Martinelli, becoming closely associated with Capri's high society through the 1960s and 70s. He also designed fabrics for, and partnered with, Emilio Pucci in staging fashion shows during the 1950s. His signature technique -- hand-painting fabric freehand with water-based dyes -- produced particularly vivid, brilliant color and remains the distinctive trait the brand is still known for. After his death, the company passed first to his wife Graziella, who had led the brand's commercial side, and then to their daughter Benedetta. The house continues to operate out of Naples, working from a showroom and separate registered-office and production addresses.
Seminole Drive, Huntsville, Alabama
Lowe Mill opened as a cotton textile mill in 1901 and later made combat boots as a Genesco shoe factory through 1978, before entrepreneur Jim Hudson converted the building into an arts center in 2001. The renovated mill now holds 153 studios and more than 200 working artists, with a maker-focused online store and food and drink vendors on site.
Best for Browsing working artist studios inside a converted 1901 cotton mill
Grandate (Como)
Founded in 1902, Mantero prints and weaves silk foulards, apparel and accessories at its mill in Grandate just outside Como, drawing on an archive of exclusive patterns. Every step is carried out in the province of Como and the goods are labelled 100% made in Italy.
Best for Printed silk foulards and scarves
Barcelona / Online
Born in 1939 Barcelona as a sports-shoe factory, Munich turned its X logo into Spanish sneaker culture — handmade-feel trainers from futsal courts to fashion floors.
Best for The X-marked sneakers of Barcelona
1-10-46 Sakurazaka, Chuo-ku, Fukuoka 810-0024, Japan / Fukuoka / Japan
The Sakurazaka gallery Kaigeido opened to exhibit and sell the Hakata ningyo of Nakamura Shinkyō and Nakamura Hiromine, a multi-generation Hakata doll house founded 1917.
Best for Hakata dolls from a multi-generation house founded in 1917.
75 J.M.N. Nkomo St, L. Takawira Ave, Bulawayo
The National Gallery's Bulawayo branch fills Douslin House, a 1901 building on the corner of J.M.N. Nkomo Street and Leopold Takawira Avenue, with Zimbabwean stone and wood sculpture, painting, basketry and Tonga artifacts. Its in-house Sabona Sales Shop sells work by local artists, from sculptures, drums and baskets to balancing birds and decorated wooden pens, alongside pieces from the DRC.
Best for Zimbabwean sculpture, crafts and gallery shop
Hamngatan 18-20, Stockholm
NK Stockholm combines fashion and beauty departments with home goods and food at its Hamngatan store. The business began in 1902, and the Stockholm building designed by Ferdinand Boberg opened in 1915. Its departments offer a broad shopping visit rather than a single workshop or a Swedish-made-only assortment.
Best for Department-store fashion, beauty and home shopping
NK's Stockholm department store stands on Hamngatan, in a building designed by architect Ferdinand Boberg. The store opened there in 1915, following the company's formation through the merger of two retail businesses in 1902. Josef Sachs was central to the development of the company and its department-store ambitions.
The Stockholm shop now brings women's and men's fashion together with children's ranges and beauty departments. Jewellery and goods for the home extend the shopping beyond clothing, while food supplies another reason for visiting. That mix makes the store useful for several unrelated purchases during one stop in central Stockholm.
It helps to choose the relevant department before treating the building as a general sightseeing destination. Someone shopping for clothing can use the same visit to look at beauty products or a household gift. The architectural history concerns the Stockholm premises, rather than every branch carrying the NK name. Equally, its Swedish retail identity does not establish Swedish manufacture for the varied products sold within the store.
Takaoka / Japan
Nousaku has cast tin, bronze, and brass tableware, bells, and vases at its Takaoka foundry since 1916, work recognized by MoMA's design store and multiple Good Design Awards in Japan. The company runs factory tours and a workshop program from its Toyama headquarters alongside its retailer network.
Best for Metal casting foundry
Khasra No- 253, ETC, Mehrauli-Gurgaon Rd, Sultanpur, New Delhi, Delhi 110030, India / Delhi / India
AD India: founded 1920 in Mirzapur by Oakley, Bowden and Taylor; India's largest handmade-luxury carpet house. YourChennai (18 Oct 2019): first India retail studio opened in Sultanpur, Delhi.
Best for Handmade carpets from a Mirzapur house founded in 1920.
Shimoda / Japan
Ogiso Shoten has cured dried fish (himono) in the port town of Shimoda since it was founded in 1900, with craftsmen still hand-splitting and drying mackerel, horse mackerel, and other local catch each morning. The shop ships its himono nationwide through its online store and keeps a full retail location for visitors.
Best for Food - Dried Seafood, Himono, Fish Products
King's Parade
Primavera has shown British studio craft and contemporary art since Henry Rothschild opened it in 1945, early on championing potters such as Lucie Rie and Bernard Leach. The King's Parade gallery sells ceramics, jewellery, glass, textiles and paintings from established and emerging makers.
Best for British studio ceramics and craft
Twin Bridges Mt / United States
R.L. Winston Fly Rods has built bamboo and graphite fly rods in Twin Bridges, Montana since 1929, now also making Bauer fly reels and its own sunglasses line. Rods, reels, and merchandise are sold through its own online shop as well as a network of dealers.
Best for Fly Rod Maker, Fishing Gear
Aix-en-Provence / Online
Santons Fouque is a family atelier of santonniers hand-making Provençal santon nativity figurines in Aix since 1934. Its output includes the well-known 'coup de Mistral' figure.
Best for Hand-made Provencal santon nativity figurines, including the 'coup de Mistral' figure
Marseille / Online
Marseille santon workshop founded by Marcel Carbonel in 1935 in the Saint-Victor quarter, where it still operates; hand-molds and hand-paints Provencal clay nativity figures and holds France's Living Heritage Business label since 2007.
Best for Hand-painted santons and nativity scenes.
Marcel Carbonel began making santons - the small painted clay figures used in Provencal Christmas nativity scenes - in Marseille in 1935, working from a workshop on rue Fort-Notre-Dame in the city's 7th arrondissement, in the Saint-Victor neighborhood where the workshops remain today. Before turning to santons, Carbonel had worked as a porter, taxi driver, streetcar operator and courier, and had left art school in 1928 for lack of means after his father's death, later learning lithography. He started the business with his wife Clotilde, a moulder, and two decorators. By the 1950s the workshop employed about ten people, and Carbonel built a reputation for detailed, vividly colored figures that helped standardize a recognizable santon style. In 1977, his daughter and son-in-law, Daniele and Alfred Renoux, formalized the business as Les Ateliers Marcel Carbonel. In 2007, the workshop received France's 'Entreprise du Patrimoine Vivant' (Living Heritage Business) designation. The Marseille site today combines a working atelier, boutique and museum, open to visitors year-round.
Nagoya / Japan
Shibori Hisada has sold Arimatsu shibori tie-dye since 1913, when it branched off an older house on the old Tokaido road; the wider Arimatsu shibori tradition dates back some 400 years. Now run by a fourth generation from two stores in Nagoya, it makes yukata, kimono, clothing and accessories in resist-dye patterns.
Best for Arimatsu shibori tie-dye kimono, yukata and accessories
Arimatsu, the Nagoya district where the shop stands, was established in 1608 after Tokugawa Ieyasu made his ninth son Yoshinao daimyo of Owari; tie-dyed indigo hand towels made there soon after are considered the origin of Arimatsu shibori, a craft that expanded over four centuries into more than 100 distinct resist-dyeing techniques.
The Hisada shop's own lineage runs through an older house, Hashimotoya, said to have been founded on the old Tokaido road during the Genroku era (1688-1704). In 1913, the tenth-generation head of Hashimotoya branched off to found an independent shop under the name Hisada, becoming its first-generation owner as Hisada Kinnojo. A second-generation owner, Hisada Haruyoshi, took over at age fifteen in 1928 after his predecessor's death, and a fourth generation, Hisada Koichiro, became company president in 1990.
The shop today operates a main store and a station-front store, both in the Arimatsu neighborhood of Nagoya's Midori Ward, selling furisode and other kimono, yukata, Western clothing, accessories and interior textiles dyed in Arimatsu shibori patterns, along with custom orders and gift packaging.
Nagiso (Minami-Kiso), Nagano, Japan
Shimizu Mokuzai has processed local timber into hinoki bathtubs, sawara sushi tubs, and ohitsu rice containers in Nagiso since 1944, running production from raw log through finished piece in its own workshop. The company also cuts honoki and hinoki cutting boards and still repairs pieces it made and sold decades earlier.
Best for A honoki or hinoki cutting board, or a cypress sushi tub
Switzerland
Swiss ski manufacturer founded in 1935 by Josef Stöckli; production has been centered in Malters, near Lucerne, since 1986 — the last remaining ski factory in Switzerland — home to the race-bred Laser series used at World Cup level.
Best for Premium skis, handcrafted
Stöckli traces its origins to 1935, when founder Josef Stöckli began making skis on a small production line, turning out an initial run of 50 pairs. The company built its reputation on manufacturing innovation: its first laminated wood skis combining hickory and ash with screwed-on steel edges appeared in 1945, it became the first Swiss maker of metal skis in 1957, and it introduced plastic-compound construction in 1965. Ski production has been concentrated at the company's Malters facility, outside Lucerne, since 1986, and Stöckli is now the only remaining ski manufacturer still producing in Switzerland. Its Laser line is the brand's high-performance piste and race series, engineered for carving and competitive skiing; specific Laser models used by World Cup racers are also sold at retail, giving recreational skiers access to race-level equipment. The company today also makes apparel alongside its core ski manufacturing, but skis handmade in Malters remain its identity.
Nagoya / Japan
Established in 1912, Suehirodo upholds the Nagoya folding-fan tradition, handcrafting ceremonial, dance, ladies' and gentlemen's sensu through each divided step of the craft. Fans are sold at its Nishi-ku shop, through a Rakuten online store and made to order as corporate gifts, with fan-making workshops on offer.
Best for Sensu, folding fans, Nagoya sensu, craft
Intramuros, Manila
A family-founded retailer selling Barong Tagalog, embroidered textiles, native accessories, shell craft, and Filipino home decor. Nestor and Salud Tesoro founded the business after the liberation of Manila. Established 1945.
Best for Barong Tagalog, embroidered textiles, shell craft
Sundar Nagar, New Delhi
Indian handicrafts retailer founded in Bombay (Mumbai) in 1906 out of the Swadeshi movement; its flagship on Sir P.M. Road reportedly hosted prime ministers Nehru and Indira Gandhi. Sells crafts sourced nationwide - blue pottery, Ajrakh textiles, Kalamkari, pashmina, brass and marble work.
Best for Curated textiles, home decor, and souvenirs from across India
The Bombay Store dates to 1906 and grew out of India's Swadeshi movement, the campaign for economic self-reliance during the freedom struggle; the brand's own materials credit figures including Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Jamsetji Tata with backing its founding. Its original flagship on Sir P.M. Road in Mumbai reportedly hosted former prime ministers Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi. The store's proposition has stayed consistent for over a century: handicrafts sourced from across India, including Jaipur blue pottery, Kutch Ajrakh textiles, Andhra Kalamkari painting, Agra marble inlay work, Kashmiri pashmina and traditional brass and metal pieces.
Carloway, Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland
The Carloway Mill on the west coast of Lewis is the smallest of the island's three Harris Tweed mills, still running a carding machine dating to 1906 and wooden finishing equipment that mills the cloth more gently than modern machinery. It produces bespoke tweed for apparel, interiors and accessories.
Best for Bespoke Harris Tweed cloth from a small artisan mill
Lunenburg / Canada
The Dory Shop has hand-built Grand Banks dories and other traditional wooden boats on the Lunenburg waterfront since 1917, using time-worn patterns, oak, pine and grown hackmatack frames. Finished dories are sold from stock and to order through its online shop, and it runs boatbuilding workshops.
Best for Boat building, wooden boats, dories
Innsbruck, Austria
Tiroler Heimatwerk began in 1934 as a cooperative of 82 knitters and 38 craftspeople, and still trades from Meranerstrasse in Innsbruck as one of the few places where hand-knitted socks, dirndls and Tracht are made rather than imported. The shop commissions work directly from Tyrolean makers rather than a factory line, keeping regional textile skills in use.
Best for Hand-knitted Tracht and regional Tyrolean handicrafts
Insadong, Jongno, Seoul
The Store from Tong-In has sold Korean antiques and craft at 32 Insadong-gil in Seoul since 1924. Its 1973 building by Kim Seok-jae is a designated Seoul Future Heritage site. The design echoes a long-necked Gaya and Silla earthenware vessel and keeps the upper floors nearly windowless to protect antique works. Ceramics and lacquerware fill the floors alongside metalwork and hanji paper. Minhwa painting is sold too, and the Tong-In Gallery shares the building.
Best for Korean celadon, lacquerware, metalwork and textiles since 1924
The Store from Tong-In has traded in Insadong since 1924. The present building went up in 1973 to a design by the architect Kim Seok-jae. He was a disciple of Kim Chung-up, one of the founders of modern Korean architecture. Its form takes after the janggyeongho, the long-necked earthenware vessel of the Gaya and Silla periods. It has very few windows above the third floor so that daylight is kept away from the antique works inside. Seoul has designated the building a Future Heritage site. The shop describes its atmosphere as solemn and classical, in keeping with the role of Insadong as the cultural centre of the city. The store is a complex space in which antiquities and modern art coexist with contemporary craft. Its antique floors cover ceramics and old furniture as well as paintings. The craft side ranges across ceramic and metal work. Textiles hang beside lacquerware inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Hanji paper and woodcraft have their own sections, as does minhwa folk painting. The Tong-In Gallery shows contemporary work in the same building. It sells online as well as from the Insadong building, and enquiries about individual pieces go through the inquiry form of the store. It remains one of the older addresses on a street now lined with galleries and craft shops, and the building itself is part of what visitors come to see.
Tottori / Japan
Tottori Takumi Kogei-ten has sold folk-craft pottery, glass, woodwork and textiles from around Japan since 1932, Japan's first dedicated mingei shop, named by folk-craft movement founder Soetsu Yanagi and standing beside the Tottori Folk Crafts Museum founded by Shoya Yoshida. The shop sells in person on Sakaemachi street and through its own online store.
Best for Folk Craft
Tokyo / Japan
Tsujiya Honten has fitted geta, zori and setta sandals to customers' feet in Asakusa since 1912, with resident craftsmen hand-lacing the thong (hanao) to each sole in about ten to fifteen minutes. Displaced from its longtime Denboin-dori shop by a rebuild, it is currently operating a temporary storefront in nearby Hanakawado.
Best for Geta, zori, and setta sandals hand-laced to fit in about ten minutes
Old Town (Obchodná)
The state folk-art centre established in 1945 runs Bratislava's Regional Craft Centre with a gallery and shop stocking work by registered Slovak masters, from Modra majolica and blue-print textiles to carved wood, corn-husk figures and woven basketry. Its craftsmen's demonstrations and courses keep techniques like fujara flute-making and čičmany embroidery in active practice.
Best for Authentic Slovak folk crafts
Milan / Online
Milan outerwear house founded in 1911; in 1935 it introduced the Valstarino, a goat-suede blouson adapted from the American A-1 flight jacket, which won royal warrants from the House of Savoy in 1939 and the Duke of Ancona in 1942 and is still handmade in Italy.
Best for The Valstarino.
Valstar was founded in Milan in 1911, initially producing waterproof outdoor clothing in heavy cotton fabrics rather than the suede jackets it later became known for. Its defining piece arrived in 1935: the Valstarino, an Italian reworking of the American A-1 military flight jacket, made from goat suede with two flap pockets, horn buttons, a knitted waistband, and a stand-up collar and cuffs. It is widely credited as one of the first bomber-style jackets designed for civilian wear rather than military use. The jacket's reputation grew quickly in Italy: Valstar received royal warrants naming it official supplier to HRH the Princess of Savoy in 1939 and to the Duke of Ancona in 1942. In 2009 the Valstarino was included in the 'From Sign to Dream' design exhibition in Milan, shown alongside other recognized pieces of Italian design such as the Bialetti coffee pot and the Fiat 500. Valstarino jackets are still made by hand in Italy, and Valstar continues to produce outerwear, knitwear and coats for men under the same name.
Tsurajima, Kurashiki, Okayama, Japan
Founded in 1909 in Kurashiki's Tsurajima district, Watanabe Shuzo Honten brews using Bitchu toji craftsmanship handed down through the region's brewing guild. Its Yume Kurashiki and Sasa labels span junmai daiginjo to kimoto-method junmai.
Best for Bitchu-style regional sake
Grünhainichen
The Grünhainichen manufactory behind the eleven-dot angels and Blossom Kinder figurines, hand-carved and painted since 1915 to designs by Grete Wendt and Grete Kühn. Angels, music boxes and gnomes are still made by hand in the Erzgebirge.
Best for Eleven-dot angel figurines
Gushan islet, West Lake, Hangzhou
Founded in 1904 on Gushan islet, the Xiling Seal Society is an institution devoted to seal engraving and stone-carved calligraphy, and its shop supplies hand-cut name seals, cinnabar seal paste, brushes and ink. Each object is checked by the society's craftsmen, continuing a scholarly tradition that has gathered seal artists for more than a century.
Best for Hand-carved name seals and seal paste
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