Sakurai (Ken Pipes)

Sakurai is the name of the handmade pipes Japanese pipe maker Kenichiro Sakurai (b. 1965) produces under his own name and under the brand "Ken Pipes." Born in Tsubame, in the Niigata region, Sakurai came to the pipe bench in middle age, carrying into wood the visual grounding he gained from calligraphy and graphic-design training. His output is not mass-produced but proceeds piece by piece.

From Design to the Bench

Sakurai's first profession had nothing to do with pipes. After finishing commercial high school he worked in sign making, design and restaurant work — trades far apart from one another — before opening his own graphic design planning and production office, Atelier KEN, in 1989. According to his official résumé, he served as a visiting instructor in the Department of Environmental Design at the Nagaoka Institute of Design from 2001 to 2008. He began pipe making in 2005, opened his own online shop in 2007 to make the work full-time, and, after a break, returned to production in 2013. His résumé also states that he has worked under Swedish maker Nanna Ivarsson since 2023.