Shira-hagi chawan Taizan kiln white Hagi ware matcha bowl displayed on wooden plank with original tomobako, Shōwa period ca. 1960 to 1975 Japan, ukiyoe print in background

Shira-hagi chawan, Taizan kiln, white Hagi ware matcha bowl, original tomobako, Shōwa period, ca. 1960 to 1975

Name: Hagi-yaki shira-hagi chawan Taizan kiln matcha bowl tomobako | KAIKO&CO
Brand: KAIKO&CO
Price: 255.0 EUR
Availability: InStock

€255.00

This bowl has a way of looking complete from any angle. The form is low and wide, the rim gently uneven in the way of something made by hand rather than adjusted toward perfection.

The glaze is a full, dense shining white over most of the body, with orange pushing through directly where the clay asserts itself. It stops you before you know why.

This chawan comes from an earlier generation of Taizan-gama, one of the kilns that has worked in the Tsubaki district of Hagi within a tradition tea masters have placed second only to Raku for four centuries.

The tomobako is inscribed 白萩茶碗 and the bowl carries the full rectangular 泰山 seal, the older mark of the kiln used before the oven was incorporated as a company.

This bowl has a way of looking complete from any angle. The form is low and wide, the rim gently uneven in the way of something made by hand rather than adjusted toward perfection.

The glaze is a full, dense shining white over most of the body, with orange pushing through directly where the clay asserts itself. It stops you before you know why.

The tomobako is inscribed 白萩茶碗 and the bowl carries the full rectangular 泰山 seal, the older mark of the kiln used before the oven was incorporated as a company.

What makes this shira hagi ware chawan special

The up close look and feel

The glaze is a full, dense white, applied thickly enough that it drips and pools where it gathered during firing. Where it thins, orange pushes through from the clay beneath, warm and direct against the white.

The surface is not smooth: tiny pinholes scatter across the body where gas escaped during firing, visible as a fine texture across the white. The iron markings lie in loose clusters, less soft than on later Hagi ware, more abrupt.

Charming details

Look closely at the white glaze and you will find those tiny craters scattered across the surface, each one a pinhole left where a gas bubble escaped during the firing.

In Japanese ceramics this is called su, and in Hagi ware it is a natural consequence of the rice straw ash glaze meeting the porous clay at high heat. Under raking light the surface becomes a small landscape.

- Style: Hagi-yaki ware. Shira-hagi style: dense white rice straw ash glaze over iron-rich Hagi clay.
- Orange iron markings where glaze thins. Su pinhole texture consistent with ash glaze firing.
- Kiri-kodai notched foot.
- Made in the Taizan-gama kiln (泰山窯) in Tsubaki, Hagi-shi.
- This chawan predates the current leadership of Yuuichi Shinoda (篠田裕一).
- The full rectangular 泰山 seal on the base indicates it was made by the previous master of the lineage, prior to the kiln's incorporation as a limited company. The modern kiln uses a round abbreviated 泰 seal.
- Tomobako inscribed 白萩茶碗, signed and stamped by the kiln master of that generation.
- Tsubaki, Hagi-shi, Yamaguchi Prefecture.
- Shōwa period, ca. 1960 to 1975.
- Diameter: ca. 12.5 cm.
- Height ca. 8.7 cm.
- Weight: ca. 504 grams.
- Excellent vintage condition. No chips, cracks, or repairs.
- Appears unused.
- Hagi-yaki clay is porous by nature: rinse with warm water only after use, no soap.
- The glaze will craze over time, and tea will slowly absorb into the clay, gradually deepening the colour.
- It is what Hagi ware is made to do and what tea drinkers have valued in these bowls for centuries.
- Allow to dry fully before storing in the wooden box.