Cloisonné

Cloisonné is metalwork decorated with enamel held in small cells, or cloisons in French, made of wire or thin metal strips. The wires stay visible in the finished piece as fine lines between the colours. The technique is ancient, and it reached its largest scale in China and its greatest technical refinement in Meiji Japan.

Definition

The maker first fixes the cell walls to the metal body, by soldering or by setting wire or thin strips on edge. The cells are filled with enamel powder made into a paste, and the piece is fired in a kiln. In older periods the cells held cut gems or glass; enamel became standard later, and cloisonné enamel was probably first made as an easier imitation of gem-set work.

Origin

Cloisonné began in the jewellery of the ancient Near East. Byzantine makers used thinner wires to make pictorial images. By the 14th century it had reached China, where it was soon used on much larger vessels. The most highly valued Chinese pieces are from the early Ming dynasty, especially the reigns of the Xuande and Jingtai emperors; the Chinese name, jingtailan, Jingtai blue ware, refers to the Jingtai Emperor, who reigned from 1450 to 1457, and to the blue that usually dominates. Nineteenth-century and modern pieces are far more common, and quality began to decline in the 19th century, when heavy bronze or brass bodies gave way to lighter copper with glued wire.

Japan produced large quantities from the mid-19th century. In the Meiji era Japanese cloisonné reached a technical peak, and the years from 1890 to 1910 are called its golden age; Namikawa Yasuyuki of Kyoto and Namikawa Sōsuke of Tokyo won awards at world's fairs. In Japanese it is shippō-yaki.

Key facts

How to identify it

• The wires. Visible metal lines between every colour.
• The body. Heavy bronze or brass in earlier Chinese work, lighter copper later.
• The palette. Blue grounds are typical of Chinese work.
• Condition. In our handling, chips and pitting in the enamel, and wear to any gilding, are the usual faults, and we note each.

Related techniques

Cloisonné is often confused with its neighbours. In champlevé, which replaced cloisonné in Europe by the 14th century, troughs or cells are carved, etched, struck or cast into the metal surface and filled with enamel, and the uncarved metal remains as a frame. In Meiji Japan, Namikawa Sōsuke of Tokyo developed two techniques of his own: in shosen the wires are mostly burned away, leaving fine details, and in musen, wireless enamel, they are removed entirely before the final firing, so that colours blend like a painting. These were made with the help of Gottfried Wagener, a German brought in as a technical consultant to Japanese industry. Kaji Tsunekichi, who studied enamelled dishes brought by Dutch ships, founded the Owari school and is called the founder of modern Japanese cloisonné. In our handling, the easiest test is to look along an edge between two colours: a thin metal line means cloisonné; a soft blend means another technique.

Where it appears in the collection

Examples include a bronze and cloisonné Guanyin censer, a large gilt square cloisonné censer on elephant-head feet and a cloisonné-decorated gilt copper ewer, on the Asian antiques shelf.

Related entries

• Kōro: the incense burner, a common cloisonné form
• Gilt bronze: the gilding often combined with enamel
• Maki-e: Japan's other decorative surface

Sources

1. Cloisonné, encyclopaedia entry, for the technique, its history, Chinese jingtailan, the decline in quality and Japanese shippō-yaki. wikipedia.org
2. Champlevé, encyclopaedia entry, for the technique. wikipedia.org
3. Namikawa Sōsuke, encyclopaedia entry, for shosen, musen and Gottfried Wagener. wikipedia.org
4. Shippō-yaki, Japanese-language encyclopaedia entry (our translation), for Kaji Tsunekichi and the Owari school. ja.wikipedia.org

Last reviewed 15 November 2026. The Japonista Curation and Concierge Team, Tokyo, Japan.