Gwen’s thoughtfulness is the centerpiece for this razor.
She, and most others, call him turtle.
Gwen is an illustrator and wanted a razor for her boyfriend. Using his nickname (turtle), she chose a page from Japanese folklore, illustrated the story with her own style, and together we finished a piece that connected to his nickname.
You can see the original artwork on this page, and I’m really taken by it. It inspired me to use an oceanic and flowing piece of figured ox horn, rely on the natural oxidation of my forged finished razors for that characteristic japanese blend of fresh steel and black steel, and frame her art with my craft.
I love this razor, and its story.
The Story of Urashima Tarō:
(from wikipedia):
One day a young fisherman named Urashima Tarō is fishing when he notices a group of children torturing a small turtle. Tarō saves it and lets it to go back to the sea. The next day, a huge turtle approaches him and tells him that the small turtle he had saved is the daughter of the Emperor of the Sea, Ryūjin, who wants to see him to thank him. The turtle magically gives Tarō gills and brings him to the bottom of the sea, to the Palace of the Dragon God (Ryūgū-jō). There he meets the Emperor and the small turtle, who was now a lovely princess, Otohime. On each of the four sides of the palace it is a different season.
Tarō stays there with Otohime for three days, but soon wants to go back to his village and see his aging mother, so he requests permission to leave. The princess says she is sorry to see him go, but wishes him well and gives him a mysterious box called tamatebako which will protect him from harm but which she tells him never to open. Tarō grabs the box, jumps on the back of the same turtle that had brought him there, and soon is at the seashore.
When he goes home, everything has changed. His home is gone, his mother has vanished, and the people he knew are nowhere to be seen. He asks if anybody knows a man called Urashima Tarō. They answer that they had heard someone of that name had vanished at sea long ago. He discovers that 300 years have passed since the day he left for the bottom of the sea. Struck by grief, he absent-mindedly opens the box the princess had given him, from which bursts forth a cloud of white smoke. He is suddenly aged, his beard long and white, and his back bent. From the sea comes the sad, sweet voice of the princess: “I told you not to open that box. In it was your old age …”
