Chashitsu (茶室, "tea room") inJapanese tradition is an architectural space designed to be used fortea ceremony (chanoyu) gatherings.[1]
The architectural style that developed forchashitsu is referred to as thesukiya style (sukiya-zukuri), and the termsukiya (数奇屋) may be used as a synonym forchashitsu.[2] Related Japanese terms arechaseki (茶席), broadly meaning "place for tea", and implying any sort of space where people are seated to participate in tea ceremony,[3] andchabana, "tea flowers", the style of flower arrangement associated with the tea ceremony.
Typical features ofchashitsu areshōji windows and sliding doors made of wooden lattice covered in a translucentJapanese paper;tatami mat floors; atokonoma alcove; and simple, subdued colours and style. The most typical floor size of achashitsu is 4.5 tatami mats (7.4 m2; 80 sq ft).[4]
In Japanese, free-standing structures specifically designed for exclusive tea ceremony use, as well as individual rooms intended for tea ceremony, are both referred to aschashitsu. The term may be used to indicate the tea room itself where the guests are received, or that room and its attached facilities, even extending to theroji garden path leading to it.[5] In English, a distinction is often made between free-standing structures for tea, referred to astea houses, and rooms used for tea ceremony incorporated within other structures.
Tea houses are usually small, simple wooden buildings. They are located in the gardens or grounds of private homes. Other common sites are the grounds of temples, museums, and parks. The smallest tea house will have two rooms: the main room where the host and guests gather and tea is served, and amizuya, where the host prepares the sweets andequipment. The entire structure may have a total floor area of only three tatami mats.
Very large tea houses may have several tea rooms of different sizes; a large, well-equippedmizuya resembling a modern kitchen; a large waiting room for guests; a welcoming area where guests are greeted and can remove and store their shoes; separate toilets for men and women; a changing room; a storage room; and possibly several anterooms as well as a garden with aroji path, an outdoor waiting area for guests and one or moreprivies.
Tea rooms are purpose-built spaces for holding tea gatherings. They may be located within larger tea houses, or within private homes or other structures not intended for tea ceremony. A tea room may have a floor area as small as 1.75 tatami mats (one full tatami mat for the guests plus a tatami mat called adaime (台目), about 3/4 the length of a full tatami mat, for the portable brazier (furo) or sunken hearth (ro) to be situated and the host to sit and prepare the tea); or as large as 10 tatami mats or more; 4.5 mats is generally considered the ideal in modern tea rooms. A tea room will usually contain atokonoma and a sunken hearth for preparing tea in the winter.
The termchashitsu came into use after the start of theEdo period (c. 1600). In earlier times, various terms were used for spaces used for tea ceremony, such aschanoyu zashiki (茶湯座敷, "sitting room forchanoyu"),sukiya (place for poetically inclined aesthetic pursuits [fūryū,風流]) such aschanoyu), andkakoi (囲, "partitioned-off space").[4] An account stated that it was theshogunAshikaga Yoshimasa who built the firstchashitsu at hisHigashiyama villa inKyoto.[6] It was described as a small room of four-and-a-halftatami and was separated from the main residence.[6]
According to Japanese historian Moriya Takeshi in his article "The Mountain Dwelling Within the City", the ideal ofwabi-style tea ceremony (wabi-cha) had its roots in the urban society of theMuromachi period (1336 to 1573), and took form in the tea houses that townspeople built at their residences and which affected the appearance of thatched huts in mountain villages.[7] Before this, tea ceremony was generally enjoyed in rooms built in theshoin-zukuri architectural style, a style frequently employed in tea rooms built today.[8]
Tea houses first appeared in theSengoku period (mid-15th century to early 17th century), a time in which the central government had almost no practical power, the country was in chaos, and wars and uprisings were commonplace. Seeking to reclaim Japan,samurai were busy acquiring and defending territories, promoting trade and overseeing the output of farms, mills and mines as de facto rulers, and many of the poor were eager to seek the salvation of the afterlife as taught byBuddhism. Tea houses were built mostly by Zen monks or bydaimyōs,samurai, and merchants who practiced tea ceremony. They sought simplicity and tranquility – central tenets of Zen philosophy. The acknowledgment of simplicity and plainness, which is a central motivation of the tea house, continued to remain as a distinct Japanese tradition in the later periods.
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TheGolden Tea Room (黄金の茶室,Ōgon no chashitsu) was a portablegildedchashitsu constructed during the 16th centuryAzuchi–Momoyama period for theJapanese regent LordToyotomi Hideyoshi's tea ceremonies. The original room is lost, but a number of reconstructions have been made. The Golden Tea Room was constructed to impress guests with the might and power of the regent. This was in contrast to the rustic aesthetics codified under his tea master Sen no Rikyū, although it is speculated that Rikyū might have helped in the design.[9][10] The room's opulence was highly unusual and may have also been againstwabi-sabi norms.[11] At the same time, the simplicity of the overall design with its clean lines could be seen as within the canon. The extent of teamaster Rikyū's involvement in the design of the room is not known, however he was in attendance on a number of occasions when tea was being served to guests in the room.[11]
The ideal free-standing tea house is surrounded by a smallgarden having a path leading to the tea room. This garden is calledroji (露地, "dewy ground") and is divided into two parts by a gate calledchumon.[6] Along the path is a waiting bench for guests and a privy. Aside from its own garden, thechashitsu is arranged – along with other pavilions such as thezashiki,oku no zashiki, andhanare zashiki – around a larger primary garden.[12]
There is a stone water-basin near the tea house, where the guests rinse their hands and mouths before entering the tea room through a low, square door callednijiriguchi,[6] or "crawling-in entrance", which requires bending low to pass through and symbolically separates the small, simple, quiet inside from the crowded, overwhelming outside world. Thenijiriguchi leads directly into the tea room.
The tea room has a low ceiling and no furniture: the guests and host sitseiza-style on the floor. All materials used are intentionally simple and rustic. Besides the guests' entrance, there may be several more entrances; at minimum there is an entrance for the host known as thesadōguchi, which allows access to themizuya. Windows are generally small and covered withshōji, which allows natural light to filter in. The windows are not intended to provide a view to the outside, which would detract from the participants' concentration. There is a sunken hearth (炉ro) located in the tatami adjacent to the host's tatami, for use in the cold months; this hearth is covered with a plain tatami and is not visible in the warm months, when a portable brazier (風炉furo) is used instead.
There will be atokonoma (scroll alcove) holding a scroll of calligraphy or brush painting, and perhaps a small, simple, flower arrangement called achabana (茶花), but no other decoration.
Chashitsu are broadly classified according to whether they have a floor area larger or smaller than 4.5 tatami, a differentiation which affects the style of ceremony that can be conducted, the specific type of equipment and decoration that can be used, the placement of various architectural features and the hearth, and the number of guests that can be accommodated.Chashitsu which are larger than 4.5 mats are calledhiroma ("big room"), while those that are smaller are calledkoma ("small room").Hiroma often areshoin style rooms, and for the most part are not limited to use forchanoyu.
Other factors that affect the tea room are architectural constraints such as the location of windows, entrances, the sunken hearth and the tokonoma, particularly when the tea room is not located within a purpose-built structure. The other factors that influence the construction of thechashitsu as a space in theiemoto are theiconography of the past and the memory of particular individuals.[13]
Not all tea rooms can be made to conform to the ideal seen in the image.
It is usual forchashitsu to be given a name after their owners or benefactors. Names usually include the character for "hut", "hall", or "arbour", and reflect the spirit of rustic simplicity of the tea ceremony and the teachings of Zen Buddhism. Characteristic names include:
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