Heini...Another Quest

[needaTEAcher]

Hello again all you Yixing Junkies (apologies to Ting ).

Here is the second installment of my latest Zisha Quest: Heini. These are my new heini pots (the solo is straight up, new "modern heini", the double-set is reported to be from the 90s, and appears to be zini on the inside, with heini "paint" or "plate" on the outside).

Heini Profile.jpg (26.78 KiB) Viewed 3033 times

Twins Profile.jpg (26.37 KiB) Viewed 3033 times

This was an attempt to show the color variation on the lip of one of the twin pots (the lid was a bit too snug so I did a little grinding, which led me to see the color difference). Can't see, but maybe seeing the inside of the pot will be helpful?

Twins Inside.jpg (27.89 KiB) Viewed 3033 times

Much like the Lvni posting, I spoke with three experts and got similair, but slightly conflicting, answers.

1-Heini is not pure clay, but rather a mixture. We guage heini quality by how "pure" it is.

2-Heini is rare, almost never seen, because it is extinct. Usually we see "heini plated" pots that are "not real Zisha", or we see pots mixed with chemicals to make them black that are dangerous to use.

3-Heini is extint, but "Modern Heini" is on the market. Modern Heini is Zisha clay (I assume zini) mixed with the mineral manganese. This is legit heini (this dude said he hasn't ever seen a real, new heini pot...only old ones or new modern heini).

So, what I take from this is that the origianl heini is extint, like zhuni and lvni, and so any new pots are likely zini mixed with manganese to for "modern heini".

Is this on par with your understandings, oh wise teachatters? Any conflicts or additions or agreements?

Thanks, as always, for your kind teachings!

[brandon]

Color accuracy of your camera aside, those don't look like hei ni to me.

[needaTEAcher]

Lol, I know. It is a camera issue I think. In real life, especially next to Zini, they definitely look black.

[brandon]

Edit: I reread your post and somehow missed that you are representing this as recent pots emulating hei ni only. I'll leave my skepticism about them being something else below for our discussion's sake.

Just my opinion but the uniformity of the grains doesn't match the period of true hei ni as I understand it.

http://i1203.photobucket.com/albums/bb3 ... G_0710.jpg

This photo I "smuggled" from Eliott's blog demonstrates the slightly irregularity in texture.



I took this photo of a friend's pot under very challenging lighting. It isn't very good, but you can make out the texture a bit in the specular highlights.

[MarshalN]

First of all, I think obsessing over clays is not a very healthy habit - there are a lot of stories out there about which clay is which (they're ALL extinct), what they do, etc. All of these stories are designed for you to blow a lot of money on pots that are otherwise not very remarkable. I think what's important is to distinguish stuff that is artificially coloured, and stuff that occur naturally. The blue and really green clays are almost definitely coloured somehow with modern technologies, so to speak. Also, I don't think you'll find meaningful difference in performance when you brew tea, unless you're talking about high density zhuni. So, with that caveat...

Black pots that are not somehow artificially black actually seem to me to have a reddish base - not very obvious, but look closely and they seem to be slightly red underneath the black. I have two pots that are blackish, here's one of them.

http://www.marshaln.com/2007/12/saturda ... r-22-2007/

The pots you bought are very regular pots with pretty common clay. I'd suggest you should only buy them if it's a very good price.

[TIM]

This sample is black sand, not black clay. 吳亞彪 made.

[needaTEAcher]

The single pot is pretty solid quality, and was sold as heini, as well as being confirmed by all three experts as "real heini". It was pretty cheap (from Malaysia), but the same thing would sell for double in Korea, and maybe double or more in the States. I'll post it soon in the Yixing Show off section.

The "Twins" were a gift, and they are very black when seen in real life (the color didn't come out well). 1 of the three experts evaluated them to be "fake", 1 said they were "poor quality clay, but real Zisha", and 1 didn't see them.

So with the whole texture thing, those pots look to have pretty big pores. They actually really remind me of a few deep, deep zini pots I have seen (usually Master pots, since the clay is rare and expensive). Is this what you are pointing too?

Tim: black sand vs black clay.....I always thought it was really just a translation thing, but that the clay-sand thing was the same. Can you illuminate at all the differences?

MarshalN, I must respectfully agree and disagree.

I agree about the difficulty in learning about different clays. I agree than many vendors are not totally (or even a little bit) honorable, and will tell you any story to get you to buy. But to extrapolate that out to all clay types and all vendors seems a bit extreme to me. I never trust someone I don't know where teapots are involved, but there are those I trust very much. If you don't trust any vendors, not even the differences between clay types and their effect on tea, they what is the point of collecting different and new clays?

I also agree that the "Twins" are poor quality clay, but I think the single is pretty solid clay. Nothing spectacular, but in a different category than the Twins. Can you post why you think it is lower quality?

As for obsessing over clay, I think anything obsessive is unhealthy. But is it obsessive to want to better understanf products that we, as consumers, are spending pretty big amount of money on? Seems responsible to want to learn more about what it is and where it is from...Where is the line, and who is qualified to draw it?

Are the different clays really all extinct? I though new clay was being mined. I have read that the new clay isn't as good as older clay, but that the techniques for refining the clay is better, and that the techniques for making pots is better....any thoughts there?

[MarshalN]

I don't think your first pot is "black" by any stretch of imagination. It looks brown to me, given the lighting. Perhaps the lighting is playing tricks on us, but if not, this seems to be pretty run of the mill stuff that I see all the time, and nothing fancy. I have no idea who these "experts" you're talking about are, and am just commenting on the pot I see through this one picture. The left of the two pots seems a little darker, but also of inferior quality, to the other one. Again, the evidence here is pretty thin so these are first impressions.

As I've mentioned on my own blog before, buying pots in the hopes that it will significantly improve your tea is a pretty bad idea. In terms of money spent, you're going to be spending a lot of money for sometimes very negligible (if not purely placebo) effects. You're better off buying good tea, or good water, because those do improve your tea substantially. Buying "better" pots to make better tea is a bad investment, basically. Trying to chase after a certain clay or another is an even worse proposition. First of all, most yixing clays, from what I understand anyway, is going to be mixed in some way or another. Just like tea, clay mined from one vein is going to be a bit different from clay mined from another vein. You can categorize them into general types, but there are specific differences too. Also, other factors, such as firing temperature, thickness of wall, pour ability, shape of the pot etc all affect how the tea comes out tasting. In my experience, there are only two kinds of people who care about clays enough to name them in every pot - people who make/sell them, and people who collect pots for the sake of collecting pots. If your goal is to collect pots, then by all means, go nuts. If your goal is to make better tea, as it seems to be the case, I'd suggest that you should worry more about the teas you're drinking than the kind of clay that your pots are made of. There is a lot of room for "tuition", so to speak, in pots. If you're starting out, which you seem to indicate you are, then I'd suggest laying off the pots for now and focus on the tea. Find things that are functional and train your tongue first. You can always come back to pots later, they're not going to go away.

As for techniques of preparing clay for pot construction, etc, modern methods have made it so that the grains of the clay are now far, far finer than they used to be even a few decades ago. This, I think, changes how the teas come out and also how the pots look, far more than the type of clay involved. I'm also personally not convinced of the need for a so-called well made pot - lids that don't fall out when you pour, pour that stops when you plug the air hole, etc - because I don't think that's what makes or breaks good tea. But that's just me. Others seem to swear by the fact that their pot stops on command, not that you will ever need that ability in a pot when you brew tea. So YMMV.

[needaTEAcher]

For sure, the color looks brown. As I mentioned earlier in the post, I think it is a camera issue. The pots are definitely black. I will try to post better pictures when I am back with my pots again.

For the twins, they are the same batch, but one was seasoned and has been used, and one has not. It is interesting to see the difference in the up close!

The experts are thus:
-A vendor in Kuala Lumpur who deals mostly with private collectors in Malaysia and China. He works with master tea pots primarily. He gave a lecture on Yixing teapots at the KL Tea Expo in June. He has displayed deep knowledge to me, and his reputation was confirmed by many whom seemingly had no connection with him.
-A man who owns a store in Seoul, and has been in the industry for more than 10 years. He has a very broad spectrum of understanding, and is one of the "all ways are correct" type of tea masters. He is one of little words, and is not afraid to say,"I don't know" (which a big reason I trust him!).
-A man who owns the entire company the second guy's store is a franchise of, who has been a high-level tea baller for many, may decades. His company owns 40 stores in Korea dedicated to puerh and zisha.

Please let me be clear: I am not new to tea, nor to puerh specifically, and I hold no illusion that teapots "make the tea better". I do know, from direct experience, that different pots brew the teas differently, and that some teas perform better in some pots and worse in others. I have been posting a lot lately about Zisha because I am interested in how people from China, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Korea seem to categorize and define the clays differently. I think the USA has a great dialogue going on right now integrating aspects of all these cultural understandings of tea and teaware. I "needaTEAcher" in the ways that we all do. I believe that once I stop learning, I have no right to teach.

As per Yixing clays being usually mixed, I entirely agree. That is totally in line with my understanding. That said, I think we can loosely categorize based on which clay is in the majority in the mixture, or in this instance, which combination of clays and minerals. Also, about the whole two types of people thing, I am somewhere between the two right now, moving towards the latter.

Ultimately, MarshalN, I get the impression that you think that Yixing clay is not worth using, and that it doesn't really affect the tea enough to be worth exploring. Am I correct? If so, why even engage in the dialogue? Rock on with your opinion, but I have a different opinion, and I will rock on with mine. No disrespect intended, just vying for my seat at the table.

[MarshalN]

Ultimately, MarshalN, I get the impression that you think that Yixing clay is not worth using, and that it doesn't really affect the tea enough to be worth exploring. Am I correct? If so, why even engage in the dialogue? Rock on with your opinion, but I have a different opinion, and I will rock on with mine. No disrespect intended, just vying for my seat at the table.

When did I say that? Why else would I own over 100 yixing pots if I think they don't do anything? My point is simply that the incremental difference between yixing A and yixing B are, for the most part, minimal, and usually not worth the money/effort. The difference between any reasonable yixing vs porcelain, however, is huge. I have never said otherwise.

[needaTEAcher]

That's why I asked if I was correct!

It sounds like you have a lot to offer to this discussion. Do you have any heini pots, and can you shed any light on the whole "modern heini" vs "extinct heini" thing? Also, you said that all the clays are extinct. Is this really true, and where did you learn it?

Thanks for taking the time to go back and forth with me. I appreciate the benefits of your experience.

Cheers!

[TIM]

Just so you know Needateacher. MarshalN knowledge in these subjects do surpasses all teachatters combine here in the forum. Thats IMHO.

[MarshalN]

That's why I asked if I was correct!

It sounds like you have a lot to offer to this discussion. Do you have any heini pots, and can you shed any light on the whole "modern heini" vs "extinct heini" thing? Also, you said that all the clays are extinct. Is this really true, and where did you learn it?

Thanks for taking the time to go back and forth with me. I appreciate the benefits of your experience.

Cheers!

Hmm, seems like you don't bother to click on links we post then?

I'm speaking tongue in cheek when I said all clays are extinct. However, every time you go talk to someone about clay, they'll tell you this - "well, this XXX amazing clay really improves the tea, but it's been extinct since the 60s/40s/Qing dynasty, but wait, I have just the thing here, stored by some master in his secret vault for all these years and made into a pot last year, here it is..." you get my drift.

How are you examining the clay? Are you using your hands? Your eyes? Are you looking at them through 30x magnifiers? I know people who do that, and I can tell you that unless the pots come from the same batch, each and every pot look somewhat different when viewed with a magnifier. Grain sizes are different, the distribution of colours change, etc. So much depends on firing and other factors that I think everyone is just guessing when it comes to categorizing clays, because what you're looking at is a finished product that has been altered substantially by the processing between raw clay and fired, finished good. Take a look at this

http://potsandtea.blogspot.cz/2012/05/y ... urope.html

Would you really know this is yixing zini? If he didn't tell you, I doubt you'll be able to make that judgement. Compare it with the pot made with the same clay by a Chinese potter

http://pu-erh.sk/shop/index.php?route=p ... uct_id=108

You tell me.

Also, as I've already mentioned before, I think it is a red-herring to chase after different kinds of clay - they don't really make any meaningful difference in terms of the tea they brew, unless you're talking about high density zhuni, which behaves a little closer to porcelain. Otherwise, just use what pleases you and what seems to come out best for you. I think there isn't a lot more to say about pots than that.

[MarshalN]

Just so you know Needateacher. MarshalN knowledge in these subjects do surpasses all teachatters combine here in the forum. Thats IMHO.

You're being far too generous. I only know what I have seen, heard, and handled.

[TIM]

Tim: black sand vs black clay.....I always thought it was really just a translation thing, but that the clay-sand thing was the same. Can you illuminate at all the differences.

Needateacher: I am no expert on these, just someone whom love to collect good yixing. Please ask your 3 masters about this subject. We would love to hear and learn more about it from your masters. Kindly let us know what their views are.

Many Thanks ~ Toki