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William Adams, an Englishman who had settled near Edo (now Tokyo), opened a small textile factory at Hirado in 1613 but it was a comparatively short lived venture. Angered by Dutch and Portuguese missionaries persistently attempting to convert what they saw as barbarian Japanese heathens to Christianity, Japan closed itself to western trade and influences for over two centuries. By the mid 19th century Japan was once more 'open for business' with the West. Japan was never a large market for cotton cloth but from 1869 the country imported a good deal of yarn. During the 1870s imports of English yarn by Japan trebled and peaked in 1881. The Japanese however had planned on starting their own cotton manufacturing industry and 'the explosive growth of cotton spinning in the 1880s, especially in Osaka, was based on the spinning on ring-frames of even coarser counts than those of Indian mills' (The English Cotton Industry and the World Market 1815-1896. Farnie.D.A. 1979). Raw cotton was imported from China and India and the mills worked round the clock using local cheap female labour. By 1894 cotton had replaced silk as Japan's leading textile industry. In 1894 the Japanese imposed equal import taxes on both cotton yarn and cloth and then began undermining the Indian cotton yarn trade by exporting cotton yarn to China. The Sino-Japanese War (a dispute with China over the control of Korea 1894-1895) created a demand for military uniforms which was satisfied by the development of power loom weaving in Japan. The Japanese also took advantage of this conflict to open up new markets for cotton yarn in Korea. This was followed up by increasing exports of cotton yarn to China which reduced Chinese imports of cotton yarn from India and Lancashire. The Japanese continued to make cotton yarn their primary export until 1916, surpassing Indian exports of cotton yarn by 1913 and Indian cotton yarn production by 1915. Japan continued to import piece-goods ('fabrics made and sold in standard lengths') from Britain but their imports began to decline after 1905. After the Great War (1914-1918) they began to manufacture their own piece-goods both for home use and for export. Exports of Japanese piece-goods to China and India exceeded those of Lancashire by 1925 and 1935 respectively. The Japanese were now able to compete effectively in most areas against Lancashire's cotton trade with the Orient. The Nishijin weavers of Japan had studied the mechanised Western weaving technology and the European textile industry and adapted their own weaving industry within a generation. Lancashire supplied the textile manufacturing machinery from their engineering workshops to the growing cotton industry in Japan; happy with the short term profits, but seemingly not registering that the longer term effects would be increased competition for Lancashire's cotton trade. It proved to be a costly mistake because by the 1930s Japan had overtaken Lancashire to become the world's largest cotton yarn and cloth manufacturers. GG View the Japan collection to find out more > |
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