Striped Tokusa Yuzamashi - 110ml
Kuramoto MasaoThis elegant Kiyomizu-yaki porcelain yuzamashi (湯冷まし - water cooler) is made in a hyōtan gourd shape and decorated in a style called sai-tokusa (彩十草), a colourful variation on the classic tokusa design of vertical lines inspired by horsetail grass. Each stripe is hand-painted in blue, green, and orange. Additionally, the rim has been gilded.
Yuzamashi are used to cool down boiling water to a temperature more suitable for brewing green tea. When poured into a yuzamashi, boiling water cools to roughly 90°C, which then will cool to roughly 80°C when poured into a cold teapot. To cool water further, you can either let it sit in the yuzamashi for longer, or pour it into cups and then into the teapot.
This yuzamashi was made by Kuramoto Masao (倉元 真佐夫) of Kōhō Kiln (光抱窯)
Made in Japan. Ships from the United States.
Width: 10 cm (3.9 in)
Height: 4.5 cm (1.8 in)
Capacity: 110 ml
Kiyomizu-yaki (清水焼) (also called Shimizu-yaki) is a type of Japanese pottery that traditionally comes from Gojōzaka district near Kiyomizu Temple, in Kyoto, Japan. A subset of Kyo-yaki which refers to all pottery made in the Kyoto area, Kiyomizu ware has been produced since the 16th century
There are many styles of chawan produced in the Kyōto area and few are as synonymous with the term Kyō-yaki (京焼 - Kyōto wares) as the colourful overglaze painted styles. While there is no agreed upon term for the general Kyōto style, the term iro-e ( 色絵 - colourful paintings) refers to the technique of overglaze painting. Unlike the painted styles detailed above which used iron pigments applied underneath a transparent glaze, overglaze decoration uses enamels applied on top of the glaze. This allows for much more colourful and detailed designs and images. The development of this style can be traced to three individual potters. Nonomura Ninsei (野々村仁清) and his student Ogata Kenzan (尾形 乾山) pioneered the style in the early-mid Edo period. Later in the 1700s, Okuda Eisen (奥田頴川) introduced porcelain technology to Kyōto which made overglaze painting easier.
