Toshiko Taira

was a Japanese textile artist who was based in Okinawa. She created , a cloth made from the fibre of the Musa basjoo, otherwise known as the Japanese fibre banana plant. Taira became a designated Living National Treasure of Japan in 2000.

Biography Taira was born on 14 February 1921 in Ōgimi. As a child, she learned to weave cotton and from her mother. In 1944, Taira worked at a spinning mill in Kurashiki, Okayama. At the encouragement of the mill's owner, Soichiro Ohara, she began to study under Kichinosuke Tonomura, the head of a folk art museum. During this time she was heavily influenced by the movement. When she returned to Okinawa in 1946 she found that many of the banana trees had been cut down or died,

After World War II, for kimono made from fell; Taira began to make table runners and cushions from coarse plant fibers, but was criticized for bringing down the quality associated with . During this period, Taira also held some exhibitions of her work. Taira opened a textile studio in 1963 and hired some local weavers in order to centralize and increase her production. and the British Museum.

Taira turned 100 on 14 February 2021, and died on 13 September 2022, at the age of 101.