(September 12, 1895 - 1965) was a Japanese businessman who is credited with the invention of "
shokuhin sampuru", the plastic models of menu items commonly displayed in restaurant street-front windows in Japan.
Life
Iwasaki was born in
Gujo Hachiman Japan on September 12, 1895.
He is said to have been inspired to create his first shokuhin sampuru after seeing drops of candle wax forming on the
tatami mat
A is a type of mat used as a flooring material in traditional Japanese-style rooms. Tatamis are made in standard sizes, twice as long as wide, about 0.9 m by 1.8 m depending on the region. In martial arts, tatami are the floor used for train ...
floor of his apartment.
After many months of trial and error, Iwasaki was able to produce a fake
omelette
In cuisine, an omelette (also spelled omelet) is a dish made from beaten eggs, fried with butter or oil in a frying pan (without stirring as in scrambled egg). It is quite common for the omelette to be folded around fillings such as chives, ...
, complete with simulated tomato sauce, that his wife thought was real on first glance.
In 1932, his fake omelette was used in a display at a department store in Osaka.
He later opened a company called Iwasaki Be-I Co., Ltd., in Gujo Hachiman, his hometown. The company still enjoys a large share, an estimated 60% of the Japanese market for shokuhin sampuru,
and the town of
Gujo Hachiman is now known as the food replica capital of the Japan.
Iwasaki was featured as a
Google Doodle
A Google Doodle is a special, temporary alteration of the logo on Google's homepages intended to commemorate holidays, events, achievements, and notable historical figures. The first Google Doodle honored the 1998 edition of the long-running ...
on 12 September 2016.
References
Japanese businesspeople
Japanese inventors
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