Banko ware 萬古焼

What is Banko ware?

Banko ware (萬古焼, banko-yaki) is pottery from Yokkaichi, in Mie prefecture, on the coast south of Nagoya. It's the clay body you're actually touching if you've ever cooked in a Japanese donabe hot pot: Yokkaichi potters make somewhere around 80 to 90 percent of the donabe sold in Japan. The kiln traces back to a Kuwana tea merchant, Nunami Rozan, who started firing tea wares in the late 1730s and stamped his pieces "banko fueki," roughly "unchanging forever." The name stuck to the region's pottery even after his own kiln closed. Production dropped off after his death and was revived around 1800 by two antique-dealer brothers, then grew into the Yokkaichi industry it is today through the Meiji period, helped by local coal and a port to ship from. In 1979 the Japanese government named it an officially designated traditional craft.

Why are most Japanese donabe Banko?

Because Yokkaichi potters found a way to make clay that doesn't crack under direct flame, and almost nobody else has matched it. Ordinary pottery clay expands unevenly when it heats up fast, which is exactly what happens when you put a pot straight on a gas burner. That's why most clay cookware needs a diffuser or slow, careful heating. For decades, Banko potters have mixed petalite, a lithium-bearing mineral, into the clay body at roughly 40 to 50 percent. Petalite barely expands when it's heated, so a pot made with it can go straight onto an open flame, take a hard temperature swing, and not split. That's the whole reason "Japanese donabe" and "Banko ware" are close to the same thing in most kitchens. The flameproof clay is a Yokkaichi specialty, patented and refined there, and it's what lets a donabe do the one thing a regular ceramic pot can't.

What else do they make?

Donabe get the attention, but Yokkaichi's other signature product is the kyusu, the small teapot used for sencha and other green teas, and in particular the shidei kyusu, thrown from unglazed purple-brown clay. Shidei clay runs high in iron, and firing it in a reduction atmosphere (low oxygen, so the iron doesn't fully oxidise) is what gives it that dark reddish-purple colour rather than the usual terracotta orange. Left unglazed, the clay is porous enough that tea drinkers say it takes the edge off bitterness and rounds out the flavour, the same idea behind Chinese yixing purple-clay teapots, though the two traditions developed separately. Beyond donabe and kyusu, Yokkaichi kilns also turn out vases, sake sets, and everyday tableware, but the two flame-and-tea specialities are what the region is actually known for.

How do you tell a Banko donabe?

Mostly by what it's made of rather than how it looks. A genuine Banko-clay donabe should feel gritty and slightly matte rather than glassy, because the petalite body isn't trying to be fine porcelain. The clay is usually a warm buff or grey-brown before glazing, and the unglazed foot ring will show that texture even on a glazed pot. If it's marketed honestly, a Banko donabe or Banko-clay item is usually labelled as such by the maker, since the heat-resistant formulation is the whole selling point. It's not a decorative style you'd mistake for something else at a glance. A shidei teapot is easier to spot: no glaze at all, a dense reddish-purple-brown surface with a slight sheen from handling and use, and a noticeably heavier, denser feel in the hand than a glazed teapot of the same size.

If you want to know whether a specific pot in front of you is genuine Banko clay, the honest answer is you often can't tell just by looking. Ask the seller, or look for the maker's mark on the base.

Using one

A flameproof clay body still isn't indestructible, and thermal-shock cracks and dry-fired pots are the two ways people actually break a donabe. I've written a separate guide to seasoning and using one properly, worth reading before the first time you put it on the stove: seasoning and using a donabe.

Browse the donabe collection if you want to see what we currently have in.

Quick answers

These are the questions people ask us most often about Banko ware, answered briefly.

Is Banko ware the same as donabe? No. Banko ware is the pottery tradition and clay body; donabe is one shape made from it, a cooking pot. Yokkaichi's Banko kilns also make teapots and other tableware that isn't donabe at all.

Where is Banko ware made? In and around Yokkaichi, in Mie prefecture on Japan's Pacific coast, south of Nagoya.

Why can Banko donabe go on direct flame when other clay pots can't? The clay is mixed with a lithium mineral called petalite, which barely expands when heated, so the pot resists the cracking that ordinary clay gets under a fast temperature change.

What's a shidei teapot? An unglazed, high-iron Banko clay teapot fired reddish-purple-brown. It's the other product Yokkaichi is known for, alongside donabe.

When was Banko ware officially recognised as a traditional craft? In 1979, when the Japanese government designated it under its traditional craft industry law.