Unmonchiku Chasen (Cloud Crest Bamboo Whisk)

Unmonchiku (Cloud-Pattern Bamboo) Chasen by Tango Tanimura

・Unmonchiku

A very rare bamboo with a cloud-like pattern due to a mutation in the "light bamboo" used to make white bamboo chasen.
There is no same shade or shape of the pattern, and each tea whisk has a different expression.

・Tanimura Tango

20th Generation Takayama Chasen Master, Purveyor of Each School of Tea Ceremony

Born in Takayama Town, Ikoma City, Nara Prefecture, he is a traditional craftsman certified by the Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry who is famous both in name and reality for inheriting the techniques that have been handed down from generation to generation.
The tea whisk made by Mr. Tango is truly a work of art.
By using the tea whisk himself every day, he is researching usability and beauty every day.

Unmonchiku tea whisks are not found in any school of tea ceremony, and were originally used by tea whisk masters themselves at home. For this reason, it is said that no other tea whisk maker, except for Tango's ancestors, has ever made one.

・History of Takayama Chasen

It was born in Takayama in Ikoma, Nara Prefecture during the Muromachi period, about 500 years ago.

It is said that Takayama Minbu-no-jō Nyūdō Sōzei was commissioned by the tea master Juko Murata, who is said to be the originator of wabicha, to create a stirring tool suitable for the tea ceremony. After that, the Takayama tea whisk that he produced was presented to Emperor Gotsuchimikado. The Emperor was very pleased with it and, along with words of praise, gave him the name 'Koho'. Deeply moved, Sōzei worked hard to make tea whisks and improve his technique, and the method was passed down within the Takayama family from one generation to the next. Later, when the Takayama family was posted to another region, they entrusted the secret craft of chasen-making to the 16 retainers who remained.