Uchiwa, traditional hand-held fans that generally are made in the same shape as a Ping-Pong paddle, have long had practical uses in Japan.

“We use them to light fires for meat grills, to cool ourselves and so on, so it’s really something that’s systematically part of everyday life,” said Tokisato Yamada, the president of the Kagawa Prefecture Fan Cooperative, an organization that employs 30 local artisans to produce uchiwa and establishes norms to make and promote the fans.

Yet outside of Japan, uchiwa — the word is pronounced OO-chee-wa and spelled the same whether singular or plural — are primarily considered decorative items. Mr. Yamada noted, for example, that uchiwa were exhibited on several occasions at the design fair Maison & Objet in Paris. “Most of the uchiwa are made from very, very fine paper,” he said. “We apply thick and durable paper as well as thin paper. And the way the light passes through them gives a different and beautiful luminosity.”

Uchiwa are different from the folding fans most people know. The various uchiwa styles are made from a single piece of bamboo, split into ribs to hold the paper taut; they cannot be folded nor do they fit in a pocket.

Ninety percent of all uchiwa are produced in Marugame, a small city of about 100,000 residents on Shikoku island, off the southwestern coast of Japan’s major island of Honshu and part of Kagawa prefecture.