Akihisa Asada
He succeeded his father, Ryoji, who won the Minister of International Trade and Industry Award for his traditional hooked roof tiles, and became the third generation of the Kyoto tile kiln "Asada Tile Factory". After studying architecture at Osaka Institute of Technology, he took over the family business at the age of 23 and started making tiles in earnest. Specializing in Onigawara, including the tiled roofs of famous temples such as Nanzenji and Toji, he makes molds considering the design, and handles everything from clay making to molding, polishing, and firing. He received PhD degree from Kyoto Institute of Technology in 2015. The title of his doctoral dissertation was "Research on the physical properties of Kyoto tiles and the erogonomics approache for traditional techniques of polishing(Migaki) ", and he experimented and considered the Migaki process that determines the appearance of the surface of Kyoto tiles from an ergonomic point of view. Furthermore, he found a guideline for handing down the technique. After that, he challenged to mold a high-design model. One of them is a high-class roof tile called Honus that appears in the only literature. The polishing process was performed many times. However, there is no existing roof tile. Reprinting is done from soil preparation. The second is a modeled object using silk screen. It is an application of technology for printing ink on paper through a mimeograph. Paper is the material for roof tiles before firing, and ink is also the material for roof tiles, that is, soil. This makes it possible to transfer a person's face or landscape onto a roof tile or ceramic. It is used for indoor figurines. The third is to raise a plaster mold using a 3D printer, stuff it with tile material, and fire it to create a three-dimensional model. It was adopted as a wall material for new hotels. In this way, he is taking on the challenge of making new products while using the traditional technique of making roof tiles in Kyoto.