Atlas8 min read
Amakusa: Seaweed Craft on Kyushu's Island Coast
A seaweed guide to the Amakusa islands of Kumamoto: Ariake Sea nori farms, dolphin straits, hidden-Christian villages, and Japan's biggest tides.
Tom Okafor ·
#japan
13 articles
Farming9 min read
Growing Nori: The Blade-and-Shell Life of the World's Most-Farmed Seaweed
Nori farming runs on Pyropia's strange two-stage life: a blade at sea and a filament hidden in shells. How the biology drives a billion-sheet industry.
Naomi Reyes ·
Atlas8 min read
The Izu Peninsula: Japan's Warm Kelp Coast Within Reach of Tokyo
Three hours from Tokyo, the Izu Peninsula offers kelp beds, coral outposts, cave dives and hammerhead waters where the Kuroshio brushes the coast.
Tom Okafor ·
Atlas8 min read
Sado Island: Kelp, Tub Boats and the Gold-Mining Coast
Sado Island in the Sea of Japan pairs warm-temperate kelp reefs with centuries of tub-boat fishing, rice-terraced hills and a storied gold-mining past.
Tom Okafor ·
Atlas12 min read
The Seto Inland Sea: Japan's Sheltered Cradle of Seaweed Farming
Japan's Seto Inland Sea: the cradle of nori farming, wakame rafts and Hiroshima oysters, the isoyake paradox of clean water, and the Satoumi renewal.
Naomi Reyes ·
Field Notes9 min read
Seeding Season in Kushiro: Learning Kombu From the People Who Named It
A field note from Hokkaido's kombu coast: autumn seeding with the Kushiro growers' guild, and what a century of kombu craft teaches a restoration nursery.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Field Notes8 min read
Second Season in Kushiro: What Year One Taught Us
Kushiro's second kombu seeding season changed almost everything from year one: timing, donors, dive inspections and the local farmers' verdict. A field log from Hokkaido.
Jack Callum ·
Atlas8 min read
Shikoku's Pacific Coast: Kelp at the Edge of the Kuroshio
Explore Shikoku's Pacific coast, where the warm Kuroshio Current grazes the southern limit of Japan's kelp — and where the word 'isoyake' was born.
Dr. Lena Fischer ·
Atlas7 min read
Hokkaido's Kombu Coast: Where Japan's Kitchen Begins
A Coastal Atlas guide to Hokkaido: Rishiri, Rausu and Hidaka kombu beds, the beach-drying harvest culture, and the kelp road that fed Kyoto for centuries.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Atlas6 min read
The Sanriku Coast: Kombu, Recovery and the Long Work of Resilience
Iwate's ria coast grows some of Japan's finest kelp in drowned valleys — and fifteen years on from the 2011 tsunami, its recovery tells a coastal story for our century.
Tom Okafor ·
Atlas11 min read
The Shakotan Peninsula: Hokkaido's Blue Kelp Coast
Cape Kamui's cliffs, water so clear it earned the name 'Shakotan blue', kombu forests and a legendary uni fishery — a Coastal Atlas guide to Hokkaido.
Tom Okafor ·
Atlas9 min read
The Noto Peninsula: Satoumi, the Japanese Art of Coastal Stewardship
A coastal atlas guide to Japan's Noto Peninsula: satoumi stewardship, ama divers, wakame culture and a coast remade by the 2024 earthquake.
Dr. Theo Nakamura ·
Atlas8 min read
Kelp Forests of Ise-Shima and the Ama Divers of Japan
A guide to Ise-Shima's warm-temperate seaweed forests, the ama divers who have worked them for millennia, and the warming waters reshaping Japan's coastal seas.
Tom Okafor ·