May be in San Jose for a conference next month. Hoping to visit Chinese
Clay Art, even if their web offerings are a bit fancy for my taste. Any
other noteworthy purveyors of tea or teaware thereabouts?

Thanks-

DM

Yo, DogMa:
If you can get over to Fremont (maybe 20 miles away-ish), 101
Plantations on Warm Springs Blvd Oriental Shopping Center (my name for
it), will serve you up a gong-fu style tea service that is great. They
have a handfull of pu-erh that is very very good, and their Jasmine
Pearls positively rock. They also had some very good high-mountain
oolongs from Taiwan and China. The website is 101tea.com, and they
have good driving maps, if you will be driving. I know this is not
actually in San Jose, but it is as close as I can get to helping you.
Hope you can make it out to them, they are all friendly and have very
good teas.
Sincerely, Teajunkie

[Dogma]
> ...Hoping to visit Chinese
> Clay Art, even if their web offerings are a bit fancy for my taste...

[Michael]
Would you kindly post the URL for this site. Thanks.
M

Michael Plant wrote:
>> ...Hoping to visit Chinese Clay Art
> Would you kindly post the URL for this site. Thanks.

http://www.chineseclayart.com/mall/c...e.asp?c=Teapot

Looks like a fun place to visit, with classes and exhibitions.

>> Would you kindly post the URL for this site. Thanks.



<http://www.chineseclayart.com/mall/c110/s25729/galleries_store.asp?c=Teapot> Looks like a fun place to visit, with classes and exhibitions.


Thanks for posting it. The wood and bamboo types are
my favorite styles to hate. In fact, I can safely say
I really enjoy hating them. Not only that, I have worked
at looking down my nose at people who like them. Then,
a friend of mine -- mutual friend of ours -- bought one,
and I actually saw it in the flesh. It was very well
balanced and constructed, the bamboo bits did not
compete dispicably with the tea, and I actually liked
it. So, humble pie, visited yet again.

Now, here's a URL for a close up of one about which I
have further questions.

<http://www.chineseclayart.com/mall/c110/s25729/images/large/Teapot_G02614.jpg>

The antiquing effect is another thing I never got into. I
thought that these teapots are made mostly to look at, not
for brewing. Is that so? (Put aside the heavy relief and
the cutout patterns. Those are other stories.

Michael

On Sun, 03 Dec 2006 23:33:45 GMT, Michael Plant >
wrote:


><http://www.chineseclayart.com/mall/c110/s25729/galleries_store.asp?c=Teapot> Looks like a fun place to visit, with classes and exhibitions.
>
>
>Thanks for posting it. The wood and bamboo types are
>my favorite styles to hate. In fact, I can safely say
>I really enjoy hating them. Not only that, I have worked
>at looking down my nose at people who like them. Then,
>a friend of mine -- mutual friend of ours -- bought one,
>and I actually saw it in the flesh. It was very well
>balanced and constructed, the bamboo bits did not
>compete dispicably with the tea, and I actually liked
>it. So, humble pie, visited yet again.

Speaking, presumably as the "mutual friend", the pot Michael speaks of
can be seen at http://www.pu-erh.net/toolfull.php?Tool=9 . I use it
exclusively for shu-pu and it has been raising quite nicely over the
last two years. It is slip cast and then exquisitely hand detailed,
the bark is layered on after the casting but before the firing and
since the extensive detailing is all hand done no two pots are the
same. The darn things look like real wood, the pictures just don't do
them justice.

The only thing I don't like about them is, especially for puerh, I
prefer a shorter spout that sits higher on the belly of the pot.

The one thing that concerns me about this Clay Art site is the price
of their Dongzhu Chen pots. They are the most expensive I have seen
anywhere. I only paid $50 for mine from M&J, but they don't carry them
anymore, plus I wont do business with M&J anymore for other reasons.
The following place has the exact same pots for less than half of the
price. I don't know the other pots on the Clay Arts site well enough
to know if the prices are high across the board, but the Dongzhu Chen
pots are definitely way out of line.

http://tinyurl.com/yxajqx
http://tinyurl.com/tpt8t
http://tinyurl.com/um24u
http://tinyurl.com/y8nq4q
http://tinyurl.com/y3dnsk


--
Mike Petro
http://www.pu-erh.net

Mike 12/3/06


> On Sun, 03 Dec 2006 23:33:45 GMT, Michael Plant >
> wrote:
>
>
>> <http://www.chineseclayart.com/mall/c110/s25729/galleries_store.asp?c=Teapot>
>> Looks like a fun place to visit, with classes and exhibitions.
>>
>>
>> Thanks for posting it. The wood and bamboo types are
>> my favorite styles to hate. In fact, I can safely say
>> I really enjoy hating them. Not only that, I have worked
>> at looking down my nose at people who like them. Then,
>> a friend of mine -- mutual friend of ours -- bought one,
>> and I actually saw it in the flesh. It was very well
>> balanced and constructed, the bamboo bits did not
>> compete dispicably with the tea, and I actually liked
>> it. So, humble pie, visited yet again.
>
> Speaking, presumably as the "mutual friend", the pot Michael speaks of
> can be seen at http://www.pu-erh.net/toolfull.php?Tool=9 . I use it
> exclusively for shu-pu and it has been raising quite nicely over the
> last two years. It is slip cast and then exquisitely hand detailed,
> the bark is layered on after the casting but before the firing and
> since the extensive detailing is all hand done no two pots are the
> same. The darn things look like real wood, the pictures just don't do
> them justice.

Yup, you the man, and that's the pot. Picture does not do it justice.

snip

Michael

Chinese Clay Art - you can buy very inexpensive good quality raw yixing clay
and good set of chahu making tools there as I did. Po Zhou is a very warm
guy, just let him know you're coming ahead of the time - they are not open
every day...
Do not forget to visit Fong's place (Imperial Tea Palace) in SF.
And of course if you decide to ski and(or) gamble - we will have the best
tea between Sierras and Rockies at my place in Reno!

Sasha.


"DogMa" > wrote in message
...
> May be in San Jose for a conference next month. Hoping to visit Chinese
> Clay Art, even if their web offerings are a bit fancy for my taste. Any
> other noteworthy purveyors of tea or teaware thereabouts?
>
> Thanks-
>
> DM