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glasspen2Profile of Isamu Sase:

He succeeded the business of his father, who had been directly trained by Mr. Teijiro Sasaki with his wife for the glass pen technique. In 1955, he founded his own business as a glass pen craftsman. In 1989, he invented the unique one-unit type glass pen, with the pen tip and the handle made as a single unit, which was taken up as a topic in magazines or TV programs. In 1999, he was awarded a Cultural Treasure of Taito Ward, and also a Best Skilled Craftsman of Taito Ward, Tokyo.


The prototype of the glass tips of glass pens was invented by Jiro Sasaki in 1902, when he was in his career as a wind chime craftsman. A glass pen was an affordable instrument that time when a fountain pen was still too expensive for common people to reach. A glass pen is featured by its smooth contact and long lasting even to be capable of completing to write a post card without refill, and started to gain worldwide popularity instantly in those countries like Italy, Germany and France. In Japan, too, it had been a common writing instrument at post offices or at counters of banks up until the oil crisis in late 1970s.
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A glass pen is manufactured from a glass rod with eight grooves in the center, which is heated to form delicate twists. The heating temperature and amount of pressure applied during the process is hardly learnt by words. It is so sophisticated that the skill can only be acquired through senses on one's hand and body. As such, it usually takes a person years' time to become skilled in performing this manufacture.

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My parents, who obtained the skill personally from Mr. Sasaki, became independent in 1912 and founded Sase Industrial Company. As their second generation, I succeeded the business of my parents in 1955 while learning to make glass pens. Towards the end of the Showa period, however, in the advent of other writing devices such as ball-point pens or sign-pens, the demand for the glass pens drastically declined, coupled by other factors of workforce shortage or suspension of ink production. A large volume of inventory of glass rods started piling up as a result.
Looking at the mounting raw materials one day, an idea hit me to begin manufacturing one-unit type glass pens of pen tips and handles thoroughly made of glass. In 1989, the one-unit type glass pen grasped immense popularity, as public medias introduced it broadly in magazines or TV broadcasting featuring its elegant shape of skewed waving patterns and superior functionality as a writing instrument. Getting aware of the boom, ink manufactures resumed production of bottled ink, making it possible to have a glass pen and ink in a set for sale.

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Both of the separate glass tip type and the one-unit type enjoy at present wide acceptance of numerous supporters. It is pleasing to note, in today's society where less people do writing by hands, that there are many people who come forward looking for the glass pens. Due to high sophistication of the skill, the production capacity of the one-unit type is only ten pieces a day. My daughter and her husband currently join my work, and the capacity will soon go up when they become able to do the job independently. More number of one-unit type glass pens will be seen in the hands of increased number of people in future.

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The one-unit type glass pen is my invention. The next challenge is how to make it become favored by young people by taking in their contemporary sense while sustaining its basic advantages of holding easiness or the superior functionality. The glass pen technique has survived showing its adaptability to what has been needed by the people that time.







Sase Industrial Company, a manufacturer of glass pens
ＵＲＬ：http://www7.ocn.ne.jp/~glasspen/index.html
 
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