When the email came through, I almost missed it. It had landed in the general inbox for the boutique, sitting between a supply invoice and a spam offer for wholesale hangers. I was scrolling half-mindedly, looking for a shipping confirmation, when the subject line caught my eye. It was short and polite, just a few words that didn’t give much away, but something in the phrasing made me click.

The message was from a small but well-respected craft foundation in Kyoto. They said they had been ...