DaveT

i've really studied the photos of the do, the construction within the damage, sabi, kokuso urushi, odoshi weave and I think its 20th century, flood victim.

For the non Japanese or French reader? My advice is to buy as many and you can. Museum Catalogues are okay, but not the best thing, so I will discount these books for now. Yet they hold many treasures. 1. Arms & Armour of the Samurai Ian Bottomley and Jock Hopson, plus anything with Ian's Name on it. 2. Watanabe Collection / The Do / Kabuto in production Trevor Absolon, love him or hate him he has produced and is producing some very weighty books packed full of information. I haven't seen anything to equal them yet for content. 3. Japanese Armour Society JAS Magazine - Ongoing Four magazines a year with a partial translation and year book containing translations from the Japanese experts and that french bloke Burowoy. (I'm banned from the JAS for being a hurtful psychopath so haven't seen a copy now for some time).

1/10 is exactly what it is. He has broken ever rule in the book. When I went to Japan and visited the Katchushi Ogawa he verbally kicked my butt all over the living room for about an hour with regard to restoring katchu without researching the correct way first. I was talking with Mr Hallam the other day about how we craftsman that have devoted our lives to learning how to do things correctly can be seen as arrogance, he was referred to as a primadona for being critical of a crap carving. The good student will accept this and learn how to do it correctly, the ignorant will ignore, call you a hater. I have met Steff two times and and exchanged many WhatsApp messages, at the Arms Fairs he attends I, Mike Hickman Smith, Bas, Les the UK shokunin host a table for collectors and the enthusiastic where they can freely ask us questions or even place a commission. 16hrs in the same room and Steff has never asked for help, he can bind tuska and lace armours with no assistance from the experts, the professionals that do this day in, day out. This Know-it-all attitude delivers the result we have seen above, discard all the excuses and talk of cocktail sticks. What we have is a prime example of a poor job conducted by someone that knows better and then seeks validation. Ian Bottomley, Trevor Absolon, Bryant and myself have provided many online FREE guides to lacing armour. It takes a quick google to locate them. When you meet us in person at symposiums and token events we help. I travelled to the Samurai Art Expo at my own expense and run a table for all attendees to come and talk about katchu, urushi, odoshi etc. Many people on this group have contacted me in the past for tips and guidance, and to date I have helped all of them. As to amateur restoration I am not fond of this and have yet to see the message board open a do-it-yourself polish your own blade section. Please do not attack me for this, I seem to be the only professional katchushi on this forum now, I doubt you will get another.

1/10

Kelly, JAUCE is a proxy service and will clear nihonto and items over 200,000 yen.8% comission.

I just purchased the book.

I know your pain, I ran the samurai armour forum with Justin for years. You are better off with a server to server back up and the hosting companies should provide that. Maybe sales and events should have a listing fee, something small. We tried to get banner ads, most dont want to pay for them. Same with dealer areas, I'd be surprised if any came forward. The reality is that your community is divided between gleamers and people that love the subject. That is clearly reflected by who's funding the forum and who's not.

Personally, I don't think your own home cost apply as it's your personal internet, when I donated it was towards the forum, not Netflix. But the additional costs of maintaining the forum could be covered by the membership. I know that what I said before fell upon deft ears but I will make my point again. When you have the total expenditure run a yearly fundraiser with a target, the members can see what the target is and how much it and the status. The fund thread can be seen and regularly updated rather than get hidden as this one does. As for selling, there are many places to sell items from Instagram to Facebook so this forum is more inclined to be a social platform and that's why the ones that use it socially are probably the funders. You could provide some of the societies/show shows with some allocated space and ask for a yearly fee to represent, promote and host them. We also have some members with very deep pockets, I guess some are just stingy, pity. Just my 2 cents.

Brian, please may I ask a simple question. What is the total cost for operating the forum on a yearly basis?

Always learning.

Maybe it was made by a katchushi in the 1950's? The shikoro has also been off as the byo are misplaced and kabuto-no-o himo are in the wrong ana. I often am suspicious of things when they don't add up.

A lot of dealers are not as knowledgable as we may think. They are not trained as katchushi and have very little idea of what can actually be altered to create a more desirable piece, so in some cases, they sell items on face value. Others commission such things and their deception is by design. The armour above was listed in a famous auction house, the description was based upon the fabricated provenance which has now become a reality. As I said above, every restoration that I conduct is now fully transparent and documented on my Social media and website, I reject commissions where the owner will not allow this. In my view restoring an armour is akin to having a sword polished, fitting a new koshirae etc, nothing to be ashamed about saving a historic piece. Also in Japan, the onus is on the buyer to know what they are buying, I purchased a kabuto from kinokuina some 20 years ago and it turned out to be patched with car filler. As collectors, we get rolled at times. I know of many high-end collections that have fakes purchased from Japan. I also know most of the dealers that like to deceive you as they have approached me to create things for them. I also know that because most of the katchushi will not indulge them they are using all sorts of modern materials themselves in-house which is a form of vandalism. Any gimp can use car filler, spray paint and lace an armour incorrectly. It's a dirty industry. Completely normal when cash is on the table.

Absolon talking about Shady Ethics. Lol. I'm currently having a talk with Momiyama-san on Facebook. He sold this armour to Trevor and by if magic, it grew gold mons on the mune-ita and kote-tekko. The Katchu world has its bullshitters just like any other community I guess and where money is involved items get changed all the time to make them more expensive and desirable. Amazing how this armour gained an instant provenance. In saying that I've done this for clients in the past, added Mon, maki-e moustaches etc. One dealer had me paint a maki-e Hige on a menpo, I charged him £270.00 and then he sold it for thousands and emailed me to rub it in. All the work I do now is fully transparent with a photographic record on my website. I'm done making dishonest greedy dealers money. So the Kabuto is now completely married to the armour because the Mon are now featured throughout. This should be a lesson for others that a Gusoku can be created, just match the odoshi and add some mon.

Irony at its best

I'll second that, great day. Many thanks.