Japanese Parasol

This is a BANGASA, which is an umbrella, in front of shops.

There are many combination between red and black color in Japan.
Since Muromachi era in 1392 Japanese ancestors have started to use contrastive color a lot.

Muromachi is known for Wabi and Sabi, which mean austere beauty and patina, so on one hand grayish colors were popular among people but on the other hand people also liked brilliant and vivid color as above picture and Kinkaku temple to show their prosperity and dignity.

As religious aspect red represents fire and black represents water.

This kind of belief is also the reason why Japanese people use contrastive color for ethnic events and certain kind of ceremony.

We often see this kind of contrastive color at Japanese festival as fan, portable shrine and Japanese lantern.