KORE KANA? is named after a Japanese word with two meanings: Is this a kana character? and is this the one? This participatory performance was part of Housewarming by Fabrica x Airbnb, where each Fabrica designer gave a different interpretation of their cultural 'welcome'.

In Japan, exchanging business cards is considered a culturally important and formal form of self-introduction, and at KORE KANA? I reinterpreted this ritual, with visitors and I 'exchanging' our names by stamping each other's names on tote bags instead of business cards.

Each stamp is made up of a broken down form of a hiragana character. I would first ask for the visitor's name and then stamp it on the tote bag, using the stamps that make up that name to create a free, non-readable, graphical pattern. The visitor is then asked to stamp freely on the same tote bag using the stamps that make up the hiragana of my name, Tomomi.

This new "ritual" allowed us to enjoy the graphical element of the hiragana form and to reinterpret a formal and high-context traditional custom as a fun cultural experience through the medium of names. The bag that each visitor took home became a visual record of how we engaged with each other's forms of names.