Echizen Washi Village越前和紙の里

The experience hall lets you make washi yourself: scoop the pulp, shake the screen and press in flowers or dyes. Prices are per piece: a coloured card ¥700, two or four postcards ¥700–1,100, six coasters ¥1,100, ten business cards ¥1,300, a large sheet ¥2,500.

Up to 30 people can work at once and a session takes 20–40 minutes. With two days’ notice there are advanced options: water-drop pattern paper ¥2,000, fans ¥1,400–2,300, an LED lantern kit ¥3,800.

The Udatsu hall is an old papermaker’s house, with the firewalls that give it its name, where traditional papermakers work with the old tools from start to finish. It is the one to see if you only do one thing besides Papyrus House.

The Paper and Culture Museum next door has films, panels and samples on the history and uses of Echizen washi, with special exhibitions upstairs. One ¥300 ticket covers both; high school students and under are free.

The shrine honours Kawakami Gozen (川上御前), the goddess said to have taught the villagers to make paper, which makes it a shrine for papermakers. The buildings date from 1843, and the main hall and worship hall are Important Cultural Properties (1984), famed for one of the most complicated roofs in Japan.

It is a walk of about 10 minutes from the village, or 15 minutes by taxi from Echizen-Takefu Station.

The Imadate district, known as the Goka (五箇) villages, supplies high-grade paper, including for certificates and art. The craft depends on clean running water, and a stream runs beside the lane. Imadate has other papermaking workshops; ask at Papyrus House which of them take visitors.

Guides list a washi shop in Papyrus House, which is the easy place to buy paper or a card you did not make yourself.