Matcha Bowls

A matcha bowl is held in both hands and brought to the mouth. The thickness at the lip, the turn of the foot, where the weight sits — how a bowl behaves in the hands counts before how it looks.

Bowls fired without glaze, so the clay meets the flame. Bowls wrapped in straw that kept the red lines it left. Bowls whose colour shifted in the kiln. Bowls pulled from the fire while hot and sunk to black. Some are carved and inlaid; some carry ash or iron glaze. Most come out of Bizen, where the landscape on a bowl is made by clay and fire alone. Even from one maker, where a bowl stood in the kiln gives each a different face.

Measured, the bowls here run 11.5–14.0cm across and 7.0–9.5cm tall. Most are unglazed, so neither the microwave nor the dishwasher suits them. Choosing by size and shape is in choosing a matcha bowl, and where these bowls came from in the history of tea ceramics.