LIST OF UTENSILS
The principal utensils of chanoyu. Those with detail pages go deeper — history, parts, use, and secondhand buying points.
茶碗 — Tea Bowl
The bowl in which tea is whisked and drunk — the utensil that most reveals the host's taste, chosen anew with every season.
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02茶筅 — Tea Whisk
A whisk carved from a single piece of bamboo. Takayama in Nara has made them for five hundred years.
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03茶杓 — Tea Scoop
A slender bamboo scoop for matcha. Small as it is, a named chashaku can carry the theme of an entire gathering.
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04棗 — Tea Caddy
A lacquered caddy for thin-tea matcha, named for its jujube-fruit silhouette.
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05茶釜 — Iron Kettle
The iron kettle whose simmering voice — matsukaze, "wind in the pines" — is the sound of the tea room.
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06柄杓 — Water Ladle
A bamboo ladle for hot and cold water. Its single, silent pour is one of the beauties of the procedure.
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07帛紗 — Silk Cloth
The silk cloth that purifies the utensils. Folding it — fukusa-sabaki — settles the mind as much as it cleans.
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08水指 — Water Jar
The jar of fresh water that anchors the arrangement of the tea-making place.
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茶入 — Thick-tea Caddy
A small ceramic jar for thick-tea matcha, kept in a silk pouch (shifuku) with an ivory lid — ranked above the natsume.
建水 — Waste-water Bowl
Receives the rinse water. Also called koboshi, it works discreetly out of the guests' view.
蓋置 — Lid Rest
A small stand for the kettle lid and ladle — plain cut bamboo at its most basic, celadon or painted porcelain at its most playful.
香合 — Incense Container
Holds the incense for the charcoal procedure: kneaded incense in ceramic for the hearth season, sandalwood in lacquer for the brazier.
花入 — Flower Vessel
Bamboo, celadon or Iga ware for the tea flowers. "Arrange them as they stand in the field," taught Rikyū.
掛物 — Hanging Scroll
The scroll in the alcove. A single line of Zen ranks highest — "no utensil comes before the scroll," said Rikyū.
風炉 — Brazier
The portable hearth for May through October, in bronze, clay or iron; shaping its ash bed is part of the host's art.
菓子器 — Sweets Vessel
For the sweets that precede tea: tiered fuchidaka for moist sweets, trays for dry ones. Sweets are part of the tea.