The name means bath spread. You stood on it while you undressed, then wrapped your clothes in it.
At a Muromachi bathhouse you spread your cloth on the floor, stood on it to undress, and knotted your clothes inside it while you bathed. Furo, bath; shiki, to spread. The name has outlived the practice by five hundred years.
What survived is a square of cloth with no fixed purpose, which turns out to be the most useful thing in a house. It is a bag, a wrapper, a parcel, a cushion, a sunshade. The shape it takes depends entirely on the knot, and the knots have names.
Dyed by stencil or by hand, most often in indigo.
Cut square — the size is chosen for what it will carry, not for a shelf.
Hemmed on all four sides, since every side becomes a knot.
The last step belongs to whoever uses it. There are named ways to tie it.
A wrapped gift in Japan is often handed over, opened, and the cloth handed back. The wrapping is not part of the present. It goes home with the giver and does it again next time.
We use them here. Nothing leaves this house in plastic if a square of cotton will do.
Pieces are found one at a time, in Japan, and photographed before they are listed. Tell us what you are looking for, and we will write when something arrives that answers it.
We write when there is something to write about — some months twice, some months not at all.
Noted. We will write when something arrives.