This collection of Kawaerakes and hand rakes are scaled down from their traditional size to fit desktop Zen gardens.
Desktop Zen gardens are like microcosms of life-sized Zen gardens. Downsized to fit on top of our computer desks, desktop Zen gardens are meant to offer users the meditative effect of raking sand. Sand levelers and hand rakes are traditional components of Zen gardens that allow you to create linear designs in the sand garden or level out the sand to start anew. Project Rotate, an LA-based design studio, recently launched a collection of desktop Zen garden hand rakes in collaboration with Yuki Kawae, a Zen garden sand artist, who designs their own line of hand rakes called Kawaerakes.
Designers: Project Rotate x Yuki Kawae
The collection between Project Rotate and Yuki Kawae features several different hand rakes, each capable of creating unique designs in the sand. A six-piece groove set consists of six handheld sand rakes that create wider sand designs. While the handle is made from natural wood, the rake is made from white trimming that takes on various shapes and patterns. The groove sets’s counterpart would be Project Rotate’s six-piece ridge set.
The ridge set’s geometric rake trimming differs from the groove set’s curved, rounded trimming, but both sets are wide by design and form a unique base pattern for desktop Zen gardens. Besides the handheld rakes, Yuki Kawae designed traditional hand rakes that come with a lengthier handle for more precise raking, lending to more intricate, detailed designs. Finally, a sand leveler provides the means for users to level out their sand, like a Zamboni on ice, and start anew.
Project Rotate describes on their website, “Designed with simplicity in mind, in the tradition of karesansui, these rakes are easy and intuitive to use. Our rake profiles will expand the possibilities for your patterns and add an extra dimension to your Zen garden. What you can create with them is up to you. Let your imagination go.”
