Exhibition of origami ninja stars sets Guinness record

The Yomiuri Shimbun

December 1, 2021

An exhibition of origami ninja stars in Koka, Shiga Prefecture, was certified as a Guinness World Record on Nov. 28.

A total of 38,105 papercrafts in the shape of shuriken throwing knives used by ninja were displayed at the Koka-ryu Real Ninjakan museum in the city, which is the birthplace of ninja warriors of the Koka school, as a challenge to gain a Guinness certificate.

The result was successfully certified by Guinness as the “largest display of origami shurikens.”

The previous record of 8,934 was achieved in July 2018 in Shikokuchuo, Ehime Prefecture, which is known as a city of paper manufacturing.

The challenge was planned to celebrate the 10th anniversary this month of a local cable television company called Aicom Koka. Origami was chosen as the medium because everybody can enjoy participating.

Participants used square origami paper of a designated size — 15 centimeters on a side — and followed a set pattern to make the ninja stars.

In Koka, calls on schools and companies to cooperate in folding the origami pieces started in September, and more than 62,000 were donated as of early November.

Shuriken that were of the wrong size or otherwise defective were weeded out, and strings of those that made the cut were used mainly to festoon stairways in the ninja museum. It took three days to fully install the paper decorations.