John Adair

The man who fell in love with tansu

By Astrid de los Rios

  Look carefully, and you'll find that Roppongi is not yet quite all steel and glass. Gently anchored behind an old cherry tree, floats what seems to be one of the last few remaining tranquil corners from a bygone era. It's called Kurofune (The Black Ship). Actually, it isn't a ship at all, but an antique shop owned by John Adair, an American of Scottish and Corsican ancestry. I opened the glass paneled wooden door of Kurofune and stepped in, to be met by the inquisitive blue gaze of Adair's eyes as he sat with his figure half etched by the soft shadows. He rose at once to greet me.  

Hailing from a banking family in Chicago, Adair decided to quit his secure job and travel to Europe. From Greece he journeyed across Asia to India. Coincidentally following in the footsteps of Commodore Perry of “Black Ship” fame in the 1850s, he disembarked first in Okinawa. From Naha he traveled to Tokyo, Little did he know that Tokyo would turn out to be the last port of call of his wanderlust journey—the place in which he would discover his life destination and the business he has been in ever since.

   Adair is now an antique dealer.He has mastered the secrets of the tansu , literally knowing them inside out; he not only knows all the intimate details of their facades and ornamentation but also the technicalities of their internal construction.

How did you begin in the tansu trade?

  “Once I decided to stay in Japan,” Adair recounts, “I realized that I needed furniture and somehow bought a tansu . After the first one, I bought a couple more. And then, in due course, a friend asked me to sell him one of my tansu, which I did.”

John's fate was sealed. Not only had he discovered tansu and the world of Japanese antiques, but also the possibility of carving out a living for himself in a pioneering niche.

 What's your view of the Japanese antiques market?

  “The dealers' market in Japan is extremely closed and competitive, although it's been gradually loosened up. I have thirty-year-old contacts in various prefectures, and they know what sort of quality I'm after. I get most of my pieces by word of mouth and at auctions.”

He went on to explain that auctions here are not quite like those elsewhere.

   “There's a scheme called “janken”. When a handful of dealers are bidding for the same piece and the price is raising too steeply, they all quit bidding. Then those interested in the piece get together and try their luck by playing the ancient children's game of janken (Rock, paper, scissors). The winner keeps the piece. However, luck doesn't come free: he still has to pay a percentage to all the losers.”

   John says that he opposes his practice, and has managed to bring about a small change to some of the auctions he participates in, a move which have been supported by some other dealers. It would appear that, contrary to other markets—such as those in the UK, where any art or antique aficionado can join and successfully bid at any auction—in Japan the auction scene is clannish and hard to penetrate.

Why the name Kurofune?

“If I knew at the time what Kurofune really stood for, and its unpleasant baggage, I wouldn't have used it. As it happened, the shop was about to open and I needed a name with a kanji (character) with good visual power and an attractive ring to it.     I was thinking of Yokohama and the foreign traders of the early days that had settled there. I wanted a name with direct ties to Yokohama and cabinetry as an art form, and so, without much time to examine other names, Kurofune became the chosen one.”

It was Commodore Perry's “Black Ships” that really opened up Japan in the middle of the 19th century—for better or worse. Yokohama was one of the first international trading ports. The pioneer early foreign traders—in Yokohama and Kobe in particular—brought in countless representatives of Western culture, including heavy furniture, and helped to ship out countless examples of Japanese artifacts. John, a man of many interests, somehow seems to be a true

heir of that period, a latter day pioneer opening up the beauty of traditional craftsmanship to foreigners and Japanese alike...

Is there a general rule on identifying the age of the tansu ?

  “As a rule of thumb, we could say that when it comes to tansu , the older the furniture is, the simpler its lines. Some of the most attractive pieces are from the late Edo or Meiji periods when there was less restriction, more affluence, and good woods and craftsmanship were still available.”

   John points out that the world of tansu is wide and varied. They include the karakuri-dansu—often called “ninja furniture”—which have lots of hidden compartments and trick mechanisms to fool robbers. Ship's captains from the 17th century liked to have chests including those features ( funa-dansu ) so that they could hide money and personal documents when at sea. Tansu like that are old and rare. More available are the regular household items from the late 19th century.

Which types of tansu appeal to you?

  “Personally, I love the aesthetic appeal of each and every tansu —its functionality and practicality. But there are no fixed rules of preference. Today it's more a matter of personal liking. Some of my clients prefer more grain and elaborate metal work, some prefer simpler lines and less metal.”

And your favourite type of wood?

“For me, undoubtedly, it's keyaki (zelkova) — gorgeous wood, solid, durable... What's so beautiful about this wood is that the multiplicity of grain gives different shadings, and the reaction of the lacquer finish interacting with the different densities of wood. And with due exposure, a wonderful patina will develop.”

Besides the aesthetic pleasure, is it the pleasure of the hunt for you, too, as is often the case when collecting antiques?

“These days, as tansu are exiting the scene; the pleasure of the hunt is getting rarer. When I do my purchases, if I've got doubts about a piece, I simply won't buy it. And naturally I get more excited about scarcer, rarer items. Over the years, your memory increases and the rush when faced with new pieces becomes less, for you have come to understand how the good things have diminished. The other equally pleasurable part is when people say, ‘Wow, what a wonderful object!!'    

   John moves around the seven-room shop like a captain roaming around his vessel to make sure everything is shipshape—he checks the flowers in a basket and nonchalantly caresses some of his tansu and porcelain pieces. Every detail is under his scrutiny in this unique shop stocked to the brim with the best cabinets still available in Japan.

Why would someone be willing to spend their money on tansu ?

  “Well, again, the main reason would be the same reason for why one buys anything—that is, to want it, to want to own it, to want to use it. It's an encounter when you find a beautiful piece that says to you, ‘I want to go home with you!' It's that kind of impulse. What I find attractive about a tansu is that wood and hardware are so tactile; they are about patina, about talented and dedicated craftsmanship. This is what conveys to each tansu its appeal and character. This type of object has a soul. And the person who can sense this and connect to it gives it more resonance.”

Not far away from Kurofune stand the sleek new masses of concrete, steel and glass that represent the age we live in now. Yet it is highly likely that their life span will be much shorter than that of the tansu now resting on the deck of the Kurofune ; nor will they acquire that beautiful patina derived from generations of use and the sense of comfort exuded by organic objects.

And the prices?

When it comes to prices you can expect to pay from a few hundred thousand yen for simpler items up to ten million yen for the lustrous sheen that the wood on some of the most desirable and rare items—kitchen chests, sea chests, and other well-loved furniture—have developed over a century of use. One reason for such high prices is the declining numbers of quality items. Since the bubble, the antique market has become increasingly tight. Choosing something to collect, however, has become so much harder given the dearth of really great pieces at the top end of the market.

    Advice to antique shoppers?

“Buy what you really like, preferably in original condition, and always buy the best you can afford.” We had a much, much larger and broader selection of top quality

pieces ten to fifteen years ago however there are still some great pieces in many categories that can be acquired while in Japan.”