Hikaru Dorodango - Making Japanese Polished Dirt Balls
85
The Art of Polished Dirt Balls
Proving they really do have an art for just about anything you can imagine, the Japanese have perfected the art of making hand-polished dirt balls. Steady, patient, manual compression is all that it takes to make these simple, smooth forms.
Think of it as the Zen of Dirt.
If you're worried that only some sort of expert would be able to handle this, I'd like to point out that the majority of the Japanese who do this are elementary-age schoolchildren. If a five-year-old kid can do it, so can you!
The Basics of Making a Polished Dirt Ball
You're going to want to use some nice clean dirt for this. Sift out any rocks or larger particles.
Using dirt from specific locations could have a strong effect on the color of the finished dorodango.
Start with your dirt and add water until you've got a really thick mud. If any water is pooling or doesn't soak in, you've got too much water and will either have to add more dirt, or let the mud sit and evaporate until it's not running anymore. The mixture should be extremely thick and pasty, almost like a dough.
Shape the mud into a ball using your hands. If it won't hold it's shape, the mixture is still too wet. Try and form as round a ball as you can. Once you get a nice sphere, put it into a plastic bag and place it somewhere slightly warm for it to dry out just a bit. This can take anywhere from half an hour to a few hours depending on your mud. If you can rest it on a soft surface, it will retain the round shape better.
Once the ball has lost some of its moisture, you take it out of the bag and begin working it again. Take some dry dirt and work it into the outside surface of the ball, being careful to damage or change the round shape as you add the loose dirt. Once you have the entire ball coated, it goes back into the plastic bag to dry out a bit more.
The next time you take it out of the bag, you'll be again adding dirt to the outer surface, but this time you want it to be very fine and dusty dirt. The ball should be very compacted at this time and the surface should be very smooth and even. You should be able to gently polish the ball with your hands at this point.
Lastly, you polish the surface of the dried ball with a soft cloth until it becomes very shiny.
How To Make a Dorodango
- d o r o d a n g o
Hikaru dorodango are balls of mud, molded by hand into perfect spheres, dried, and polished to an unbelievable luster. The process is simple, but the result makes it seem like alchemy. - Hikaru Dorodango: Interesting Thing of the Day
Mud isn't generally considered a very useful or beautiful substance, but one of the latest trends in art (especially popular among young Japanese children) is making elegant, shiny balls out of ordinary mud. - Shiny Mud Balls | Science and Education | Trends in Japan | Web Japan
At elementary schools, kindergartens, and preschools all across Japan, kids are losing themselves making hikaru dorodango, or balls of mud that shine. - What are Hikaru Dorodango?
Hikaru dorodango are nothing more than spherical mud balls created from dirt and water, but they can be polished to a surprisingly high sheen.
Mythbusters - Polishing Poop - Busted!
You CAN Polish A Turd...
Ever here the phrase "you can't polish a turd?" Well, it turns out that you really can.
The TV show Mythbusters took on just that challenge and created dorodango using different types of animal poop. Watch the video to see just how they did it!
Dorodango Blogs
- Knitting While Intoxicated: Hikaru Dorodango
Anjali at Giant Jean's Parlor wrote an interesting account of her experience making dorodango at local festival in Japan. I'd never heard of dorodango before-- beautiful shiny balls made of mud and originating on Japanese playgrounds. ...
- The Gerke Family: Dorodango
So they had a guest come on who makes Dorodango - a shiny, Japanese dirt ball. Just adding water to make it muddy, they squeeze it to a ball and after a long, long amount of time, the water is all squeezed and evaporated or something ...
- Nurtured by Love: Dorodango
In early 1970, there were still a lot of dirt around my house and my two sisters and I made DORODANGO (Dirt-ball)all the time. We pretended that dorodango was a rice ball when we played house. We sometimes competed that who could make ...
PrintShare it! — Rate it: up down flag this hub
Have You Tried Making Hikaru Dorodango?
This is the coolest thing ever try it
wow this is cool am gonna try it... maybe not with the poop
Amazing! Great hub.
If you get a finished dorodango wet, it will pretty much turn right back into mud, and fairly quickly too. And yes, they will shatter if dropped. They can also be scratched or cracked with little effort so take care...
A bit gross with the dog poo. Don't know what else to say. How do it get the gloss and does the dirt balls shatter when dropped.
I love love love this!
I love any art from nature. Thanks for this hub because I've not only learned something new - but I will try it and then have somethng to share!
This is way cool!
can u get a dorodango wet after u polished it?
The dorodango become solid, but not something that won't crack or split if you drop it or if you drilled it. I mean, c'mon, think about what they are made of and the process used to make them...
Hey Relache, how hard do they become? Rock hard? Hard enough to use a dremel to put a hole through them?
Wow, this is super fascinating!!! I need to really try this :)
Time to buy some dirt...
a good project for the weekend.... thanks!!!
Those look incredible. I think I need to try this myself. I wonder how Nelle's are going?
Different :)
So my mud balls have received their second coat of dirt, no shine yet. But it is quite relaxing.
As long as you don't have any carpal tunnel issues, you should be okay, Nellie.
Okay I am on my way out to the garden to get some dirt. It's been raining here for about 5 days, so my mud balls may take some time to dry out. But I have got to give this a try. My doctor did say that I needed to find a hobby...
tom says:
5 days ago
not easy