Note: The text below is the transcript of the YouTube video above.
I’ve always been drawn to Japanese ceramics. There’s something about them you just can’t find anywhere else — but what is it exactly? Why do they look softer, quieter than Western ones? I could never quite explain it. But after visiting a 400-year-old kiln in Kyoto, I think I finally found the answer. And it turns out, it has everything to do with Japanese food culture, the quality of light, and an aesthetic philosophy called wabi-sabi.
That’s what today’s video is about.
Hi, I’m Satomi Takayama, an artist based between London and Japan. On this channel, I share the inspirations I collect for my creative work.
Today I’m visiting Asahiyaki, a kiln in Uji, just south of Kyoto. They’ve been making tea ceramics primarily here for 400 years. This is Matsubayashi Hosai san, the 16th generation.
Matsubayashi-san: To the east of Uji, there is a mountain called Asahiyama. Asahi-yaki is made at the foot of that mountain, using clay from Asahiyama. That is why it came to be called Asahi-yaki.
Uji is a little removed from the centre of Kyoto, and that distance gives it a different atmosphere. It’s quiet and unhurried, with the river and the seasonal colours giving it a real sense of place. Matsubayashi-san told me the nature here feeds directly into his work, and honestly, you can feel that just being here.
So I asked him about the difference between Japanese and Western ceramics, and what he told me genuinely surprised me.
Matsubayashi-san: There are differences in the clay itself, and also in temperature but the biggest difference I noticed while I was there, or rather, something I was told, is that they fire at incredibly high temperatures. From where we stand, that’s roughly 50 degrees higher. Because their pottery is fundamentally designed to be used with knives and forks, it needs to be hard enough to resist scratching. So durability is very important. That made me realise that there is a culture there of firing ceramics until they become extremely hard and solid. And that’s what changes the texture and feel of the pieces. Japan is a chopstick culture, and chopsticks are inherently gentle on the surface.
Isn’t that fascinating? The same object, a bowl, feels completely different because of what you eat with. The softness and texture of Japanese ceramics that always felt so natural to me — maybe that was partly shaped by the food culture it came from.
But the tools were only part of it.
Matsubayashi-san: The light in Japan is just so soft. So mild. The light over there is sharp and clear.
Satomi: Britain is completely different though.
Matsubayashi-san: If anything, winters there are incredibly dark. And the buildings too. Newer buildings are fine, of course, but older ones are often made of stone, and the lighting sometimes feels as if it has simply been placed where candles would once have been lit. So overall, while Japan can feel overly bright, in that kind of dull, dark winter, I think something with a bit more punch — a stronger, bolder colour — probably lifts your spirits more than soft,
natural-coloured pottery. It reflects a different sensibility from Japan’s four seasons, with their sparkle and natural beauty. And that sensibility is reflected in the pottery too. The colours are simply stronger. I sometimes wonder if even the structure of the eye itself might be different.
Satomi: Really? From that level?
Matsubayashi-san: Yes, I think so. The world they see and the world we see, I genuinely think they’re different.
Satomi: That’s a new discovery.
With Japanese ceramics, the natural colour of the clay and the glaze just feels at home in the Japanese atmosphere. And maybe that’s simply because it was born here.
And I think as a Japanese person, maybe I’ve always been drawn to things that quietly reminded me of Japanese nature, without even realising it.
And when Matsubayashi-san started talking about gardens, that feeling became even clearer to me.
Matsubayashi-san: It’s the same with gardens. A traditional Japanese garden looks like it’s growing freely, yet when you step back, it has this perfect balance. But take Versailles, for example. If everything isn’t clearly ordered and controlled, it just doesn’t read as balanced. That instinct to take total control of nature is, I think, a fundamentally Western way of thinking.
When he said that, I immediately thought about the lines in my own paintings. I’ve always been drawn to lines that aren’t quite straight. Lines that breathe a little, that have some wobble in them. I never really knew why. But maybe it goes back further than I realised.
And it’s not just gardens.
Matsubayashi-san: Take calligraphy like that, for example. That idea of drawing with momentum, and letting that momentum become the form, is not really part of Western thinking. Whether something can be expressed with a single line or whether it is highly decorative, there is a very strong emphasis on the completed form in that moment. But Japanese people really appreciate the energy behind the act of making. Whether the movement was bold or delicate, we can feel that time and motion embedded in the work. When we look at calligraphy, we are not only looking at the characters themselves. We can also enjoy the presence and movement of the person writing them.
Satomi: Does that not exist in the West?
Matsubayashi-san: It may not be completely absent, but compared with the Japanese sensibility, I think it is much less prominent. On the other hand, when it comes to typography, fonts in the city, or the design of signs, Western design is absolutely more refined. The balance is simply cleaner. Japanese design can feel, how should I put it, rather cluttered in that area. But I think that is probably just a difference
in what each culture is good at.
I grew up doing calligraphy at school, and I had lessons outside of school, too. Thinking about it now, that probably shaped the kind of lines I’m drawn to without even realising it. And maybe that same quality in the lines is exactly what I feel in Japanese ceramics.
So where does this all come from? Why did Japan develop this aesthetic in the first place?
Have you heard the term wabi-sabi? It’s a word that’s essential to understanding Japanese aesthetics.
Very simply put, wabi-sabi is the ability to find beauty in imperfection, in simplicity, in the quiet traces that time leaves on things.
The person who really gave this idea its shape, within the world of tea ceremony, was a 16th-century tea master named Sen no Rikyu.
Matsubayashi-san: One truly epoch-making and symbolic moment was when Sen no Rikyū brought the concept of wabi-sabi to its fullest expression. Until then, perfection was beauty. Rikyū argued that imperfection is, in fact, the deeper beauty. That was a defining moment in Japanese aesthetics.
Before Rikyu, the most admired ceramics in Japan were refined, jewel-like pieces from China — smooth, flawless, almost perfect. But Rikyu shifted the focus. Instead of perfection, he found beauty in imperfection — in roughness, irregularity, and the raw feeling of the earth. That’s a radical idea. And the fact that it stuck, and that it’s still alive in Japanese culture centuries later, is something I find genuinely moving.
But Asahiyaki’s story doesn’t end with wabi-sabi.
Asahiyaki has a deep connection to another tea master named Kobori Enshu. And Enshu took wabi-sabi somewhere new. Where Rikyu moved away from perfection and polish, Enshu showed that imperfection and elegance could coexist. This aesthetic is often described as kirei-sabi.
Kirei means refined, beautiful. Sabi carries a sense of quiet rusticity. Put them together, and you get something like refined rusticity, or elegant simplicity.
Matsubayashi-san: The tea master who guided the first generation of Asahi-yaki was Kobori Enshū. He had inherited the idea of wabi-sabi from Rikyū, of course. But at the same time, when it came to shaping the aesthetic sensibility of the next era, he turned back to the world of perfection that had once been rejected. I believe he was someone who sought to bring perfect beauty and the imperfect beauty of wabi-sabi back into harmony. So he explored whether something slightly primitive and rustic could coexist with elegance and refinement, in a space, in a single vessel. And that sensibility is still reflected in Asahi-yaki today.
Asahiyaki has been exploring kireisabi for over 400 years. There’s a quiet dignity to their pieces — something that makes you want to sit a little straighter when you drink from them. And what struck me most was that each generation brings their own interpretation of it. The philosophy stays, but the expression keeps evolving.
What I love about this conversation with Matsubayashi-san is how it started in one place and ended somewhere completely different.
I came in asking why Japanese ceramics look softer than Western ones. And by the end, I was thinking about what Japanese people have found beautiful across centuries, and why certain lines and shapes speak to me the way they do.
Wabi-sabi and kireisabi aren’t really something you can fully explain. You can try to describe them, but they’re felt more than understood. And the way Matsubayashi-san continues to interpret kireisabi through his own work is something I want to keep watching.
Wherever you live, I’m sure there’s a craft or an aesthetic tradition that’s shaped how you see the world, even if you’ve never consciously thought about it. I’d love to know what that is for you. Leave a comment, and please reply to each other too. I really want this channel to be a place where we learn from each other, not just from me.
If you’d like to know more about Matsubayashi-san and his work, I’ve included details in the description below.
I also made a video going deeper into the differences in light and colour between Japan and the West, based on this conversation, so check that out after this if you’re curious.
I’m also thinking of putting all these Japanese stories together as a journal or something. Because what I’ve been experiencing here is really meaningful, and I want to share it with more people. I’ll announce it through my newsletter first, so subscribe if you want to be the first to know.
I’ll see you in the next one.
