Matsui is a family business run by only 4 people. Father Noriaki is the 3rd generation Warosoku craftsman, with over 50 years of experience.
His daughters Hihiro and Mie are the 4th generation. Mie is making the candles and Hihiro specializes in hand-painting and decoratin the candles with illustrations, texts and crystals.
She also developed their unique warosoku DIY painting set, that allows people to try this craft at home.
Since the second generation, Matsui has been committed to producing sustainable recycled vermilion candles in consideration of the future global environment, and they strongly support the SDGs "Sustainable Developmemt Goals". They promise to continue making environmentally responsbile, traditional candles with the best raw materials, experience, skill and trust.
A lot of time and craftsmanship goes into producing each and every candle. There are fifteen different steps, some of which require several cycles, all done by hand. Once the wicks are made, they are placed on a bamboo skewer and placed in the hot wax. Large candles can take up to 300 layers of wax before reaching the perfect size! The whole process is done by hand.
Finished candles are either white, painted red or decorated with hand painted drawings. These "E-rosoku", or "artwork candles", originated in the Tohoku area, where they were said to brighten up the snowy white winters and to form a replacement for flowers on the Buddhist altars.
