Come the end of the year in Japan, there¡¯s a rush on cleaning services, straw decorations and boxed osechi ry¨ri (traditional New Year¡¯s cuisine). But over the past few years, a new item has joined Japan¡¯s January prep lineup: planners.
Japan has a globally renowned stationery industry, with niche items you never knew you needed, like ¡°memorization pens¡± that make it easier to study and highlighters that leave rulers ink-free. In that spirit, Japan¡¯s decades-old take on the paper planner has now gone mainstream and is spreading quickly across the world.
The ³Ù±ð³¦³ó¨ notebook combines the words for ¡°hand¡± and ¡°account book,¡± and its most popular version is the ¡°Bible size,¡± at 17 by 9.5 centimeters, just about the dimensions of a compact Bible. Broadly speaking there are two kinds: the toji ³Ù±ð³¦³ó¨, whose pages are fixed, and the shisutemu (system) ³Ù±ð³¦³ó¨, which is customizable.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.