Folding Fans: Cooling Accessories Encapsulate Elegance

Overview

In Japan's humid summers, people cool themselves with fans that can be conveniently folded away. Large folding fans, or ogi, were first used as symbols of nobility in Heian court rituals over 1,000 years ago. Later, smaller folding fans, or sensu, were incorporated into festivals, the performing arts and tea ceremony, and came to be recognized as works of art embellished with gold, silver and lacquer. Still a part of life today, discover the cooling arts of Kyoto-made sensu through the ages.