I just recently descovered the japanese braiding technique called kumihimo and decided that I needed to try it right away.

With a little help from my father we built this humble marudai, one of a few different looms that can be used for this process, and by far the simplest to build.

First I started out with a simple 8 strand braid. Please excuse my background mess.

I will soon take some better images of my final sample braids but for now here is my first completed kumihimo braid.

I next endevored to try a fancy looking 24 strand braid. This braid unlike the first is a flat braid.

Here is a look at how the 24 strand braid came together.

The next braid I decided to experiment with was a 12 strand spiral braid, here is how its coming out so far.