Atsuko was born and raised in Mishima, gateway to the Izu Peninsula.  Her parents ran a business at home, and she always loved helping her mother and grandmother in the kitchen preparing meals for the employees.  After studying art and design in Tokyo, she had a chance to visit Toluca, Mexico, where she met and married Chihiro Kato, a ceramic artist who had been sent there on the Japanese government’s cultural project.  After completing Chihiro’s mission, the couple returned to Japan and started living in an old folk house in central Izu, where they established Pottery and Restarurant Rakan.  It is over 10 years since Chihiro passed away, but Atsuko, just like before, opens her restaurant only for one group a day serving her exquisite and delicious dishes on Chiriro’s artisanal ceramics.