Itoroku has been selling thread in Kyoto since around 1871, when founder Gisuke Imai opened a small business trading silk and cotton thread. Over 150 years later, the company is still guided by the same simple idea: sell good thread, with a smile, and the business will last.

In the Taisho era, third-generation owner Rokujiro Imai joined the business and became known around Kyoto as “Ito-ya no Roku-san,” Roku the thread seller. His motto was to always smile, never lose his temper, and sell only good-quality thread. In Japanese, the characters for “thread” (糸) and “sell” (売) combine to form the word “continue” (続), and Rokujiro believed that was the heart of the trade. In 1929, the company took his nickname as its name.

In the 1920s, silk thread was sold in loose skeins that were wound by hand and tangled easily. As everyday life became more convenient, customers grew tired of the hassle. Rokujiro set out to make silk thread easier to use, and became one of the first to sell it wound neatly onto cards, ready to sew straight away.

Each card of thread carried a little smiling face drawn from Japanese characters, a nod to Rokujiro’s motto of always keeping a smile. Known as Niko Niko Pure Silk Thread, it remains Itoroku’s signature product today, loved by sewists for its quality and its cheerful, unchanged design.