Japanese teacups 湯呑み

What is a yunomi?

A yunomi is the everyday Japanese teacup: tall, cylindrical and, in its most common form, made without a handle, used for steeped teas like sencha, hojicha or genmaicha rather than matcha. It became the common way to drink tea from the Edo period onward, once sencha itself took hold as an alternative to the more formal matcha ceremony. Our Mino-ware Black Shino teacup is the exception on our shelf with a handle, an inky black glaze marked with soft white bursts, with each piece coming out a little different.

How is a chawan different from a yunomi?

A chawan is wider and lower, built to give a bamboo whisk room to move while making matcha. The word chawan also does double duty in everyday Japanese as the general term for a rice bowl, so context decides which object someone means. Our guide to cleaning a matcha bowl and whisk covers the tea-ceremony version if you already own one.

What is a sencha cup?

A sencha cup, or senchawan, is smaller and more formal again, generally kept for serving a guest's higher-grade green tea rather than for everyday use, and a matcha bowl is usually bigger and thicker than a sencha cup, the two being built for different jobs rather than one bowl at different sizes. Our Fukui Craft Lines cup is a straightforward example: a handleless ceramic cup at 170 millilitres, 8.5 centimetres across, named a sencha teacup on the listing itself.

What are ours made from?

What we carry spans a handful of potteries. Mino ware supplies the handled Black Shino teacup above and an Irabo tea set, a teapot paired with two matching cups in a rustic, earth-toned glaze; the set makes a natural pair with our guide to kyusu teapots if you are choosing a pot to go with it. Kyoto's Kiyomizu tradition comes through Asahido, whose plum and Japanese white-eye teacup is small enough, at 7.7 centimetres across, that the listing itself calls it a cup you hold in two hands rather than a mug. Maruko contributes a hemp leaf pattern cup carrying the asanoha motif, a growth and resilience symbol common on children's goods in Japan.

Do all our teacups go in the dishwasher and microwave?

No, and hand-painted decoration is the deciding factor again. The Mino-ware Black Shino teacup is listed as dishwasher and microwave safe. The Asahido Kyoto teacup is hand wash only, kept away from the microwave to protect the painting. Fukui Craft's sencha cup is hand wash only but microwave safe, and Maruko's hemp leaf cup is hand wash recommended with the microwave allowed.

Quick answers

These are the questions people ask us most often about Japanese teacups, answered briefly.

What is the difference between a yunomi and a chawan? A yunomi is a tall cup for steeped tea, usually handleless; a chawan is a wider bowl for whisked matcha.

Can you drink sencha from a chawan? Not typically. A chawan is shaped for whisking matcha; sencha and other steeped teas are drunk from a yunomi or a smaller sencha cup instead.

Why don't Japanese teacups have handles? Stoneware, the usual body for them, passes less heat to the hand than porcelain, which is why a cup without a handle can still be picked up.

Is a yunomi the same as a sake cup? No. Both usually lack a handle, but a yunomi is for tea; our guide to sake cups covers ochoko, guinomi and the rest of that set.