Anyone who has tried sharpening a pencil only to have the tip break can appreciate how brittle and fragile a pencil lead can be. Even pressing too hard on the page can result in a broken lead.

But to Japanese pencil carving artist Shiroi シロイ (@shiroi0003), the challenge of creating exquisitely detailed works of art on the tip of a pencil was too great to pass up. Inspired both by commonplace objects and icons as well as elements from popular Japanese culture, he carves minutely detailed creations that obviously require patience and skill.

His craftsmanship was on display recently when Shiroi posted his latest creation on his Twitter account:

Astonishingly, he reproduced the Tokyo Skytree, currently the world's tallest tower (a distinction which it will keep for at least a few more years until it is replaced by the Dubai Creek Tower). From the complex design of the base to the observatories, the neofuturist design of Tokyo Skytree is reproduced in remarkable detail.

The post quickly went viral, and now has over 171,000 likes and 25,000 retweets at the time of writing.

"[Completion of New Work] I made Tokyo Skytree out of a pencil lead."

Reproduced with permission from シロイ Shiroi (@shiroi003)

Reproduced with permission from シロイ Shiroi (@shiroi003)

In this photo, you can see the sculpture compared to a one yen coin for scale (a one yen coin measures 20 mm in diameter, which is somewhere between a US penny, 19.05 mm, and a nickel, 21.21 mm)

Reproduced with permission from シロイ Shiroi (@shiroi003)

Examples of other works

Here is a small sample of some of the other pencil lead sculptures Shiroi has created:

Buster Sword from Final Fantasy VII Remake

Pencil guitar

「荒ぶれる鉛筆」(pencil gone wild)

As you can see, Shiroi also likes to make chains out of his pencil leads, which looks really cool. There must be some trick to it, even though at first, it's hard to imagine how individually separated chains can be made like that out of a single lead.

煉獄杏寿郎 Rengoku Kyōjurō

As an example of his typographic works, here's the kanji name of the popular Flame Hashira from Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

If you'd like to see more of his amazing sculptures, follow Shiroi on his Twitter and Instagram accounts.

By - Ben K.