The 15th Annual Japanese Cultural Arts Event (Aki Matsuri) will return to Bellevue College Sept. 8-9. The event includes on-stage performing arts, martial art demonstrations by local dojo members, puppet shows based on Japanese folk tales, tea Ceremony and Ikebana demonstrations.

Featured this year is highly skilled blacksmith and chaser from Sendai-shi, Japan, Eikichi Yaegashi, who makes decorative steel handles, lock plates, and other hardware for a chest of drawers.

A full-scale Omikoshi from Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America will be on display during the two-day event. From noon on Saturday, there will be a Shinto ceremony to purify the Omikoshi on the main stage in the Gym followed by the Omikoshi procession in the campus courtyards.

The event will take place from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 8, and 10 a.m.to 4:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 9 at buildings C, D, E, L and R. The college is located at 3

3000 Landerholm Circle SE. Admission & Parking are free, but fees apply to some workshops.

Eikichi Yaegashi will demonstrate how to make traditional metal fittings by embossing and incising three-dimensional, dainty figures on the thin steel plates. COURTESY PHOTO