POSTALCO
Video, 6min 40sec, 2009 (TRW06)

Postalco is a stationery and leather goods company based in Tokyo and owned by Mike and Yuri Abelson. They moved to Tokyo in 2001 from New York City where Yuri worked as a graphic designer and Mike as a product designer. As Postalco, the Abelsons partner their individual strengths to produce finely-crafted products that have garnered them praise and devoted fans not just in Japan but around the world.

We met up with Mike and Yuri at their shop in Kyobashi, a sober, no-funny business neighborhood wedged in the shadow of Ginza, Tokyo's commercial bright star. The shop is a fully-realized distillation of Postalco's elegantly utilitarian sensibility; their complete product line is displayed alongside office supplies, art projects, and a small library of reference books and curiousities. At first the shop might appear to better fit in high-end Ginza -- Postalco is not cheap --but its presence in a decidedly workmanlike neighborhood on the fourth floor of a faded office building is, to us, a quiet testament to more humble concerns. And in the end, it's the kind of place you enjoy looking to find. Later on we visited their office/studio in Kobama, a leafy neighborhood only a few train stops from Shibuya yet where the thin-air cluster of Tokyo's high rises recedes quickly into a distant memory. The contrast in settings between shop and studio seems to highlight a good balance in their approach to work: their ability to unify what they want with what they do and to craft a lifestyle that works. It's nice.

We talked with Mike and Yuri about issues of craftsmanship and why they run their business in Japan. Postalco has always struck us as a perfect Japanese company: simple forms that belie obsessive attention to details and quality, masking intricate design considerations and construction challenges. While they've been expanding their presence in the United States, Mike and Yuri spoke at length about how living in Japan is important, if not vital, to the success of their company.

For us, each time we visit Tokyo we wonder how we could ever figure out a way to move to that city we love. What makes Postalco so perfect for this WORKING series is the way Mike and Yuri have answered this question: by pursuing their interests so resolutely that they've had little choice but to do what they want. Mike and Yuri show that by concentrating and perfecting the skills you have can very well lead to broader horizons, new lessons, and richer experiences -- the kind of life you want. Yeah.