A late 90's 90ml Yixing Teapot

So I know a few years I wrote a post somewhat denouncing yixing ( I forget if it was on this blog, or my tea blog), but I have slowly waded in, and the pace has made all the difference.  The first rule of Yixing, do not even think about yixing until you have read massive amounts about them, and drank massive amounts of tea so you know where your tastes lie.  Somewhere in there you should also look through massive amounts of pictures, it would help if these pictures also came with feedback from others indicating to some degree if anything look suspect.  While not all bad pots can be identified by picture, ( and some good pots do not look that great in photos), at least being able to start there is a good way to make sure you do not make many many many dollars worth of mistakes.

This pot has a wonderful clay body, while not overtly sandy on the outside, there is obviously a very fine sand inside the clay body itself, its as the vendor put it after I bought the yixing "a very strokable pot." This is the best photo I have been able to snap of the texture of the pot, and yes it is mildly textured just through the creation process itself.

Thought this picture was fun, not perfectly lined up, not entirely sure if it is the pot or my angle with the photo, but fairly straight line through the spout nob, and handle.   I should also remakr about the color, I have other Zini pots which are honestly more brown, this pot as these photos hint has a nice purple/ reddish hint to it, in person the pot almost reminds me of a deep maroon color, a very nice and appealing color.

Like what you buy and buy what you like

So every new tea drinker somehow hears about the magical qualities of Yixing. I am not to say they do not exist, but with Yixing I feel it should really be a personal desire to use these pots or not. I just sold 3 of my Yixing pots, and I have plans to try and find homes for the rest sometime in the future. But in short I have decided Gaiwans are by far preferred by me, for Chinese tea.

That is not to say I never got joy from yixing, I enjoyed watching the pots develop a patina slowly through use, much like I enjoy watching my hagi yaki change slowly through use. It just has to do with the fact that yixings never sang to me like Japanese and Korean ceramics.

The short summation of my experience with Yixing, the right pot will compliment the right tea, but then in the end you are not really enjoying the tea as it is somehow slightly changed by the yixing. Then you run into some worrying questions such as "does this tea taste good because it is being brewed in this pot?" or "would this tea taste better if brewed in a different vessel?"

Some people enjoy the hunt of matching the perfect yixing teapots with the perfect tea's, I am not one of those people. So I will stick with my love of other ceramics.