Bird Bottle Opener

I needed a new bottle opener. The one I'd been using was one of those 99 cent grocery store church key deals. It did the job, but wasn't anything to look at. I kept it atop the fridge for easy access. But, the cheap metal began to bend, and with every bottle I opened, it became more and more misshapen. Hell, the metal looked like it was about to snap in two.

So, when I ran across this beauty at Canoe, I knew I had to have it. My new bird opener wasn't inexpensive, but it looks damn good. This was designed be legendary Japanese iron artist Tadahiro Baba. The beauty if this lovely piece is that the beak opens tin tans (like pineapple juice or like product) while the back of the foot and the tail feathers work in concert to open bottles (like beer or the bottle of ginger beer for Moscow mules).

Here's the rough translation I was given at Canoe of the booklet that came with the opener...

Without speaking of "material," we cannot talk about "craft." Because, character of Iron and Copper have been decorated people's life with craftman's knowledge and skills. We could say that we need space for "crafts" in current society which had broaden and materialized lifestyle. However, "new relationship between human and things" must be created with harmony of design and material. In the past, we had almost lost wealth of our spiritual life to industrial society. We should not lose our humanity to civilization.