Rugged and raw: words not often employed to describe our products, but highly appropriate in this instance.

The Niwaki Kōnin Coat is outerwear for jobs like splittling logs, humping hay bales and spinning yarns around a roaring campfire. That was the inspiration anyway, but if you want to slip it on for a gentle stroll to the coffee shop you’ll still look the part. Let’s temper ‘rugged and raw’ with ‘stylish and versatile’.

Unlined, this is the sort of coat you layer up or down depending on the weather, giving you year-round wear. It’s constructed from heavyweight, slightly rough cotton canvas, richly dyed with real indigo in Kojima, the home of the Japanese obsession – religious fervous, almost – for denim and workwear.

We’ve kitted it out with plenty of cavenous pockets (special mention to the load/poacher pockets along the inside hem) and included a few areas of snazzy Himo cord piping for a dash of urbane sophistication. Custom Niwaki brass buttons and sturdy rivets complete the look.

You’ll have to trust us on this one, but the best thing about this coat is not something we can show you yet: we guarantee that it’s going to age beautifully, developing the sort of characterful fading money can’t buy.

Everyone’s favourite quilted jacket is now available – for this season only – emblazoned with our distinctive Niwaki Camo pattern and lined in a pale carnation pink. Lightweight but still toasty, it’s our go-to layer for pottering about in the garden, bulking up for colder days or wearing around the house when cranking the thermostat feels a little too indulgent.

For this special edition, we’ve turned the jacket inside-out with the stitching for the quilting pattern on the inside and the smooth, non-stitched side on the outside. This does not affect warmth. As usual, the sleeves are cut a little shorter than a standard coat, to allow unimpeded movement and to keep cuffs out of the mud and/or washing up bowl.

Equipped with two spacious front pockets, a simple inside pocket, a single button to keep it from flapping about and lashings of idiosyncratic flair. We doubt you’ll see another one, but if you do please congratulate the wearer on their evident taste and expect the same in return.

Exquisitely crafted and beautifully weighted, these copper watering cans make precise watering in the home, greenhouse and conservatory an absolute pleasure, delicately delivering a smooth and accurate flow of water that is perfect for seedlings, succulents, and other indoor plants.

The largest of the three, at 2.5l capacity, comes with a removable copper rose for a fine, gentle spray.

Students of fluid dynamics will tell you all about static pressure and viscous friction, and might even mention the Bernoulli Effect in regards to spout taperage, but the proof, as they say, is in the pudding, and all you really need to know is how smoothly these babies pour. Picture a Moroccan tea master and you’re halfway there.

The copper meanwhile, does wonders for your plants. Water left in the can for a few hours gets sterilised through a process known as the oligodynamic effect, adding essential micronutrients and fighting nasty bacteria with some nifty cell membrane disruption - especially useful when it comes to protecting seedlings from damping-off.

A standard post-war Showa-era electrician’s knife, for cutting and splitting cabling (and much more besides), the design evolved from even older Meiji-era sailors’ knives.

We picked up a similar knife years ago in an antique market in Tokyo and found it to be hard-wearing, strong and simple – perfect for use around the home and garden as a proper working knife. It’s not overly refined or sharpened, so you don’t need to treat it too delicately.

We liked both blade designs so much that we’re offering you the same choice.

The rugged alternative to our standard gardening gloves, fashioned from thick yet supple leather with a suede palm patch for added grip and protection.

A pair of Kawate Gloves offers rugged abrasion resistance and several degrees more protection than our lighter-weight Gardening Gloves. They’re not thorn proof but they will provide a bit more warning of incoming spikes, and will likely become your go-to pair for heavier duty outdoor jobs.

And the name? “Te” is hand, “kawa” is leather. Put them together and you get “kawate” – leather hand.

Did you know you lose up to 80% of your body heat from your head? Of course, this is only true if you have an extremely large head, otherwise it’s about 7%. But still, can you afford to lose 7%? That, no doubt, is the question that’s brought you here.

If you are going to keep your head warm, don’t you want to look good while doing so? Enter the Yukiguni Woolly Hat – a softer take on the original Niwaki Woolly Hat, with a ribbed design and slightly tapered crown to give a little extra height at the top. A small Niwaki label on the cuff announces your gardening credentials.

Knitted in Japan from 100% wool, we love them so much we made two colourways: a red reminiscent of the akane madder plant, and a soft konjo blue. Flip a coin if you can’t decide – they’re both very nice.

‘Yukiguni’ means ‘snowy country’ in case you were wondering, referring to the mountainous north west of Japan, and Yasunari Kawabata’s novel of the same name.

From temples in Kyoto to hidden artworks in Wales, Mexican lava fields to The Burren in Ireland, Niwaki presents 136 pages of horticultural meanderings, all lovingly researched, photographed and assembled over the last 12 months for your reading and ogling pleasure.

Issue No. 3 features:

• Seirai-in: 750 years in the making by Jake Hobson & Kohei Soeda
• Seijun Nishihata: sap in the blood by Alex Edouard
• Helwyr planhigion Fferm Crûg: Sue & Bleddyn Wynn-Jones by Alex Edouard
• The private pleasures of gardening: Nigel Slater and Jake Hobson
• In earth returns: David Nash’s Ash Dome by John Warland
• Four views of Rousham by Alex Edouard, Emli Bendixen, Tom Stuart-Smith & Ashleigh Aylett
• Erratics, epiphytes & endemics: plant hunting in Ireland by Paul Wood
• Contemporary Japanese gardens: weaving gardens – Yard Works, EN’S and Oryza by Hanako Kono
• After the fall: wreckage and repair in a Mexican garden by Kendra Wilson
• The road to Shōden-ji by John Warland

It’s the perfect antidote to short-form content, AI-slop and all the other horrors of the so-called ‘attention economy’: just turn off, tune out, wonder where you left your reading specs.