Happy Holidays, everyone! With the holiday season coming in, you may be wondering what you’re getting for Christmas. Well, here’s one good news from Chikuhodo, one of the biggest, and the best Japanese makeup and calligraphy brush manufacturer.

Chikuhodo releases “Chikuhodo Noel Collection” every year, gorgeous limited edition sets for Christmas.

This year, we have Interviewed Chikuhodo for backstory and development on these LE sets as well as idea and design inspiration for Noel collection 2017.

Without further ado, let’s check out the details below!

Chikuhodo Noel Collection set details

Vin Rouge

$334 / ¥38,100

This 6-brush set, the Vin Rouge is the most expensive Christmas set Chikuhodo has made in years.

It also features slanted foundation brush, a unique type of makeup brushes from Chikuhodo. This type of bristle enables the user to evenly apply the foundation or product without worrying much about the angle of the brush.

Powder Brush (Grey Squirrel)

Length: 163mm, Bristle: 48mm, Shape: Round flat

Foundation Brush (Saikoho)

Length: 136mm, Bristle: 21mm, Shape: Round flat

Highlight Brush (Grey squirrel & Sokoho)

Length: 152mm, Bristle: 37mm, Shape: Round flat

Eyeshadow Brush (Weasel)

Length: 135mm, Bristle: 20mm, Shape: Round flat

Eyebrow Brush (Tanuki; Japanese raccoon)

Length: 122mm, Bristle: 7.5/5.5mm, Shape: Slanted

Lip Brush (Weasel)

Length: 126mm, Bristle: 11mm, Shape: Flat

*Comes with matching brush pouch

Vin Blanc

$132 / ¥15,100

The very first Christmas limited edition set that features compact, retractable brushes. It is certainly a big change to the Noel collection, which always had normal brushes with specially designed ferrule and handles.

Chikuhodo has a portable series called “K-series” which is popular in Japan but not so much in the oversea market. One of the reasons why they chose the retractable brushes for this collection was that they wanted to see the reaction from fude lovers outside of Japan.

While portable brushes have smaller bristle, they are densely packed to compensate for its size.

4 brush set that includes…

Powder Brush (Grey squirrel & Sokoho)

Extended: 175mm, Portable: 105mm, Bristle: 40mm, Shape: Round

Cheek Brush (Sokoho)

Extended: 128mm, Portable: 72mm, Bristle 31mm, Shape: Round



Eyeshadow Brush (Grey squirrel & Weasel)

Extended: 140mm, Portable: 100mm, Bristle 11mm, Shape: Round flat



Lip Brush (Weasel)

Extended: 139mm, Portable: 100mm, Bristle: 11mm, Shape: Flat

The idea behind the 2017 Vin Blanc / Vin Rouge collection

The name stands for white wine/red wine in French following the Noel collection tradition, how did the Chikuhodo decide to chose the name?

“There were many concept sketches and ideas on the board, and the white one and deep red design stood out among others. Since we chose the blue-ish as a key color for 2 years, we wanted to try something new this year. We decided to pick shimmering silver and deep, rich red colored design but didn’t have a name yet. One of the staff in the room said the color reminded her of the red wine. Since the name matches well with the festive season, red wine and white wine are a pair just like the Noel collection is, we chose to name it “Vin Blanc” and “Vin Rouge”, respectively.” – Yutaro Takemori, Chikuhodo.

For the Noel collection, Chikuhodo always released two limited edition every year. A small set that cost around $150 and another full set around $300.

This year, they decided to create more elegant, mature and classy look. The pattern of the handle and the ferrule embodies this idea, with the colorful circle pattern on the brush handle of the collection designed in the image of Christmas tree ornament. It represents an image of joyful celebration of the holiday with delicious feast accompanied by a glass of wine and heartfelt conversation.

Development process for Brushes of 2017 Chikuhodo Noel collection

The whole development process for Noel Collection takes about 6 months.

It starts with a design and concept. Chikuhodo works together with the designer to come up with few unique idea to entertain and surprise us. Then all the ideas will be chosen by Chikuhodo staff and CEO, not exclusive to the development team.

For a limited collection like Noel, there is a lot of room to explore in the development process for Chikuhodo. Challenging handle design, materials you can not use in regular series such as using Makie or trying out another new idea. In many ways, Noel collection serves as a testing ground for future brush lineup.

Handle/Ferrule Design

Once the design is decided by Chikuhodo development team, they start working on making a number of prototypes to see what works the best, and to see which material, coating works the best to present the final design. This is the longest process for the development of the new brush series.

Designing the best Bristle for the collection

When designing a new makeup brush, Chikuhodo starts from the needs of the customer; brush usage, hair type, price range, bristle hair and size of the brush. So while there may be a similarity between the set brush and other brushes from series, it is not based on the other model but rather designed from scratch.

This is especially true when developing a new makeup brush set since you have to balance all the factors above while keeping the price as affordable as possible.

Noel Collection 2017 Release date

The very first package of the collection is scheduled to start shipping on 20th November to the end of November.

With only 300 sets produced, if you are interested in getting this special winter gift from Kumano, Hiroshima. Be sure to check it out in pre-order page here

Written by Hiro Kano

We’re writing about traditional crafts, Kumano brush, makeup and beauty with the cooperation of manufacturers and workshop on this blog. Please Like, share and leave a comment below!

Also, please let us know if there are certain topics you’d like to see covered in here by emailing me at kano@a-janaika-japan.com. We’re always open for the request!