Yunomi cups of Hagi ware pottery

In the early 17th century, the long Age of Civil Wars in Japan finally finished. The tea ceremony became popular among the samurai in a high status. Accordingly, they made much of the tea things including the bowls.

Many daimyos ordered the potters to create their original pottery ware for tea bowls. Hagi-yaki was one of the ceramics.

So it doesn’t have rich colors like an Imari (Arita) ware or Kutani ware. They express the mind of “wabi” and “sabi” which are essential for a tea ceremony. A Hagi ware improves with use.

It is the best Japanese pottery for drinking Japanese green tea!

Japanese green tea:effects, types and how to drink

What’s a Hagi-yaki?

Origin

During the Age of Civil Wars, the high‐powered daimyos, Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) and Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1537-1598) became the patron of Sen-no Riyu (1522-1591).

He established the Japanese tea ceremony and pursued the idea of “wabi” and “sabi”. And Mōri Terumoto (1553-1625) also has the association with the great tea master. He had often thought to create a new pottery for tea bowls.

From 1592 to 1598, the Japanese armies invaded the Korean Peninsula by the order of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Though the invasion fell through, the daimyos including Terumoto taken the Korean pottery from the country to Japan. Because the Korean ceramic were most popular for the tea ceremony.

The feudal lord of Hagi Domain Mōri Terumoto treated the potteries Lee Shakuko and Lee Kei (brother) with hospitality and make them create a pottery of Hagi. It was the origin of Hagi-yaki.

Features

The texture of a Hagi ware is soft and plump. Most of the wares don’t have painting. They express the beauty with only the shapes and the colors and patterns of the clay and glaze.

The craftsmen of the Hagi ware mix three soil, Mishima (red), Daido (gray), and Mitake (white). And they mainly use the loquat color glaze or white bush clover color glaze.

The more you use it the more they change the colors. That is called as “various changes of Hagi ware”.

See other pages of Hagi-yaki