Time seems to stop at Eiko Araki's studio in Japan. Women sit around her in a small circle, painstakingly stitching intricate patterns on balls the size of an orange. They are keeping alive an ancient Japanese craft called temari. Each ball, or temari, is a work of art, with colorful geometric patterns. They're destined to be heirlooms, or treasured works of art in homes. An embroidered temari ball can take weeks, even months to finish. Some cost hundreds of dollars. The women hand-dye the cotton threads using dyes made from plants, flowers and other natural ingredients. The concept behind temari lies in an elegant otherworldliness that is very labor-intensive to create.
