TeaChat

A small gaiwan and two cups arrived in a nicely packaged box in the mail last night.

This is my first purchase from Greenwood Studio. I am *very* happy with what arrived!
(thanks Shawn )
The gaiwan barely holds 50ml of water. That probably translates to about 30 ml once full of leaf. It will be used for nice sheng puerhs.

The proportions of each component are a nice combination of aesthetic and functional. I like the slightly bowed aspect of the lid, the thin lip of the gaiwan cup and how it progresses to a sturdy lower half. Thanks to the extra heft, it should retain heat quite well. I used some '90's HK stored leaf to start out. After that one session there were already preliminary signs of tea patina developing!





The saucer has a recess perfect for fitting the bowl of the gaiwan. It has space to move around a bit, but is deep enough to give it a very secure feeling.



Lid detail:
The fit of the lid is perfect. It is just unsymmetrical enough to allow a fast pour with optimal filtering of leaf.



The cups are also quite nice. Maybe a bit bigger than I normally use. They hold about 50 ml.

A happy set!

Thanks for posting Bio Love your pics. Have you noticed how the unglazed clay has a tendency to create a sort of vacuum lock with the lid. I wonder what the physics of that is. Its so much more pronounced then a glazed gaiwan... thanks again for the pics!

GREENWOODSTUDIO wrote:Thanks for posting Bio Love your pics. Have you noticed how the unglazed clay has a tendency to create a sort of vacuum lock with the lid. I wonder what the physics of that is. Its so much more pronounced then a glazed gaiwan... thanks again for the pics!

You are welcome.
Yesterday was just the 2nd session. It is perfect for one person. I will compare the "seal" with another gaiwan.

What do you use to drink smaller amounts of tea?

Thanks again!

We are getting ready to load the wood kiln this weekend. I decided to take a little video of the kiln site and empty kiln today. We always take video of the firings so people never really get to see the inside. It's not the prettiest kiln in the world but it works
http://i856.photobucket.com/albums/ab12 ... 5f81ec.mp4
I've got a lot of teaware going in this this time around. Here's a few, some shiboridashi with lots of layered slips that will have a simple shino over them, to hopefully get a lot color variation in color.


Bio, I usually don't drink REALLY small amounts but I do have small gaiwan that I use for tiny portions or sampling. I use all kinds of brewing pots, but I think my goto is a gaiwan. I have a small kyusu (that is a second), about 80-90 ml, from one of my wood firings that suits most day-day brewing needs.

Fire on the Mountain

Loading day 1 of 2 for the next wood fire. Got about 1/3 of the pots in there. We'll finish loading tomorrow and fire next weekend, WOOHOO!!
http://i856.photobucket.com/albums/ab12 ... 981bba.mp4

Neat video, gives a nice sense of the scale of the work required.

Finished firing the wood kiln today. Unloading it on Thursday, I hate waiting
Another video I made which is a bit random. In retrospect I wish I would have filmed it so it was a clearer narrative of the firing and included more information and explanation, but I did what I could in between stoking
http://i856.photobucket.com/albums/ab12 ... 15106e.mp4

Just unloaded my wood kiln today and I'm SOOOO happy. Best firing for me in a long time or possibly ever. Very low loss rate ! I literally have a couple hundred new pieces of teaware, all different types and styles. I'll try to post some proper photos soon. I'm on my phone now so all I can do is post a teaser interior of a little teacup, hehehe.

Tons of melted ash in the bottom of this baby, crystally rutile blue modulating to white on porcelain.

That is ... mesmerizing, Shawn! Spectacular.

... in a gadda da vida ...

I sense obsessive repeat etsy viewing in the offing....

Thanks Chip Yeah, that glaze does crazy things on porcelain. I think you have a piece of mine with this combo, but I'm now doing more tea appropriate shapes thanks to all my teachers here on TC.

I apologize for these photos and for the length of this post. I just took them quick to show some new stuff, and I think the settings on my camera are screwy. They look kind of washed out on my screen.
Here's a shot of the cup in the detail above.

I've been messing around with a bit of cobalt underglazing. I turned out pretty close to what I had hoped, that is that the imagery would move and blur a bit from the glaze and ash. It seems that the more intricate the brushwork the more interesting it is when it's washed out a bit from the firing IMHO. The imagery here is depicting a Vajra or Dorje, the Tantric Buddhism lightning-bolt symbol. It's porcelain glazed with a subtle celadon.


Some shino on porcelain, looser style.

Plain celadon on porcelain

A Chawan with shino on stoneware, dipped and brushed off with a stiff brush. I always seem to make my chawan to small, so I think I over compensated here making these almost 6"w

One of it's little sisters in teacup size

kyusu (terrible picture)

That's all for now, thanks for looking

GREENWOODSTUDIO wrote:Here's a shot of the cup in the detail above.

I like that cup very much! I'd love to see more and bigger pictures of it.

Those look great, Shawn! I especially like the blue&white one, with the vajra/dorje(googled for pics to determine which but was none the wiser ).