Greeting

“石茂” is pronounced as “Ishimo.” It is our original character made of two joining elements; 石, meaning stone, and 茂 for 芳村茂右衛門 which is the succeed name of our company. This character has long been recognized as our symbol, being used as our house name, since the foundation. It has been said that our company started to use 石茂 in the early Edo Period. However, the history of masons in Kyoto is much longer than that. According to the historical records, many masons were working in Kyoto during the Heian Period.

It has been said that Japan has “the culture of wood and paper,” because the wooden building is the basis of the Japanese culture. However, the important thing to mention is that stones were always used as the foundation, on the purpose of preventing buildings from natural disasters, such as rain, wind, and earthquake. Stones play important roles in various ways. Stone walls, bridges, fences, and pavements improve the surroundings. Stone torii gate, monuments, and Buddhist statues are objects of worship. Furthermore, stone lanterns and washbasins are placed as ornaments in Japanese gardens. In short, stones has fitted in the Japanese culture and society and been used in daily life from ancient times.

Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan, has a great number of temples, shrines, machiya (traditional merchant houses), and tea gardens. Even nowadays, you can still see many kinds of stone products at these spots. It means that stones protect “the culture of wood and paper” of Kyoto. As a stone company in Kyoto, we would like to keep maintaining the culture of stone. With our family motto “お客様大事 (Think Customer First)” we do our best to provide good products and good craftsmanship at good prices.

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