Odawara

This print shows a young woman wearing a light, single-layer cotton robe, or yukata, a popular garment for summer. She is a traveler along the Tōkaidō, the most important road in Japan that connected Edo (today’s Tokyo) with Kyoto. She chats with a woman selling souvenirs after taking a bath. A bold pattern of chrysanthemums adorns this yukata. Its uneven edges are the printmaker’s visual shorthand for the tiny circles created by tie-dyeing, used to construct larger patterns.