The pattern is not painted on; it is ground out. Tsugaru-nuri is built up from many layers of lacquer in different colours and then polished back, so that the lower layers surface as a mottled pattern. Nothing is drawn. The design appears during the abrasion, which means the maker is discovering it rather than executing it, and the finished appearance cannot be fully predicted before the polishing has begun.

Workshops are scattered through the city of Hirosaki rather than gathered in one quarter, some of them open for visitors to watch the lacquering and the polishing, and there are shops that will take in an old piece and refinish it for whoever brings it in. Hirosaki has universities and hospitals and is small enough to cross by bicycle, though the snow is deep in winter and clearing it is a constant obligation. Lacquer needs both time and humidity in order to cure, so a single vessel takes tens of days to complete, most of which is spent waiting.

A pattern produced by grinding cannot be recovered if you grind too far. Where to stop is decided during the polishing itself, by eye and by hand, which is why two pieces put through an identical process come out different — and that difference is the point of Tsugaru-nuri rather than a defect in it. The refinishing shops follow from the same fact. Polish an old piece back again and the layers underneath return, in a new arrangement, which is not true of any lacquer whose decoration sits on the surface. A worn Tsugaru-nuri bowl is not damaged so much as partway through its next pattern.