Japanese-style torii gateway marks Lara residence
By Julia Wolf
Holcombe resident Tom Lara likes to keep busy and his most recent project makes for an eye-catching display.
A Japanese-style torii, a gateway he made himself, spans the driveway of his residence.
“I saw it on a program about this blind samurai,” said Lara, who says he finds the Japanese and Chinese cultures interesting.
He says he had seen torii before, but that particular one stuck out to him and decided he would make one for his place.
Lara began researching different styles of torii on the internet and took elements from different ones that he liked. He says he tried to keep the design light, instead of solid, so it doesn’t catch as much snow or seem as appealing to birds for their nests.
The torii is a part of the Shinto religion, and symbolically marks the divide between sacred spaces and ordinary spaces.
Because it is a religious element, Lara says there are a lot of rules about how a torii should look, from color to material. Since he put the gateway up more as an artistic focal point than a spiritual one, Lara didn’t necessarily follow all the regulations.
Lara says he started by rounding up the materials. Since his driveway is 15 feet across and he wanted to span the entire thing, he had to find something that would work.
He ended up finding cedar support beams on Craigslist, some treated pine and the steel posts from a scrap yard.
“It’s always endless, what you’re going to need,” said Lara. “Screws and bolts, and all that stuff.”
He also made the plaques displayed on the torii by copying the calligraphy and blowing it up. From there, he cut out the design and stenciled it in with gold paint.
“It means peace,” said Lara, of the writing on the torii.
There is also a picture of a chrysanthemum beneath the writing, the national flower of Japan.
He built the gate almost entirely by himself. He did hire a crane to erect the structure and a portable mill to cut the wood for the project, but did the rest himself, including digging the holes for the footing.
The project was completed about a month ago.
“It took me about two years,” said Lara, who did the work on the side of his other commitments. “I like to keep busy.”
Lara plans to start another project next year, a Japanese garden, complete with an arch bridge. He says Japanese gardens are small and he plans to keep the design low maintenance.
“It’s enjoyable,” said Lara. “Just to put something up that you made with your hands is rewarding in itself.”
