gorgeous wooden figurines by take-g

Gorgeous, meticulously detailed wooden figures by Takeji (Take-G) Nakagawa. You can view his incredible process over at his blog.

"Yosegi-Mokuzougan, or joined wooden block construction, is craft skills where combinations of original and unique colors and textures of different kinds of wood are utilized to express artistic patterns. In Japan, the Hakone-Odawara region is famous for this traditional handicraft. Products of the Take-g Toy’s have expanded this traditional craft skill, which usually employs two-dimensional patterns, by using three-dimentional patterns, instead. We use four different kinds of wood, a keyaki (a Japanese tree of the genus Zelkova), a teak, a walnut, and a white ash."