Beautifully made from stainless steel and decorated with images from the Japanese zodiac, the Shinwa 15A mitre square is a highly useful layout tool.

Square and 45 degree lines can be placed with accuracy and ease, as can parallel marks and opposite angles thanks to the cutouts in the web.

Both scales read vertical centimeters, the square side starting from the base of the foot and the angled side from the top of it (the foot itself is dead on 5mm thick so it’s easy to transpose if necessary.

As well as the obvious applications for marking out crosscuts, shoulders, mitres, mitred dovetails etc it is also very handy for sliding under things to measure the gap.