Sake Cups & Vessels 酒器と盃

Japanese rice liquor “sake” drinking cups and serving vessels come in various forms. They also have unique names for their unique forms and size. For the Japanese sake cups, here we have “Guinomi (ぐい吞み)” and “Bajyo-hai(馬上杯)” both of them have relatively large content such as more than 50cc(ml). The very small size sake cups are called “Ochoko(おちょこ)”. In most cases, they only contain 50cc(ml) or much less volume.

“Ochoko” originating from the Japanese phrase “chotto” meaning very little/small and it is designed to sip a sake since sake was very very precious and sip little by little. On the other hand, “Guinomi” comes from the Japanese phrase “guitto” =swiftly ” nomu”=drink, for a larger volume of sake. In the case of “Bajyo-hai”, it directly means, a sake cup on a horseback. Therefore it has a long stem, which is easy to hold by one hand, while a Samurai warrior is riding a horse. From this, we hope you would sense some kind of an atmosphere that the sake cup style inherits from the Japanese sake drinking history.

Sake cups in general, are made from many materials; such as porcelain, metal, bulk wood, and lacquerware. Each material has its style and a taste of sake, and they are different. Historically, lacquerware has been considered the most prestigious and formal cup to drink sake. Urushi lacquered red/vermilion is a divine color, like that you see in Japanese shrines. Nowadays we still inherit that tradition, however, the beauty and gratitude of drinking sake with lacquerware have become a daily luxury for us.

For the sake vessels, here we have vessels called “Katakuchi(片口)” meaning lip on one side. The size of the vessels comes from the Japanese traditional volume unit; “gou(合)”. The volume of 1 gou is 180cc, it is still a base unit volume when ordering sake in Japan. Here we introduce 1 gou (180cc) and 1.5 gou(270cc) size vessels to match our large Guinomi and Bajyo-hai. However, the use is not limited only to serve sake with them. Vessels are suitable to serve dressings or even wider vessels are used to serve food, while you might not necessarily use the lip. Same with the sake cup, they are relatively larger sake cups so they fit nicely to serve hors d'oeuvre or amuses, like many nice Japanese restaurants often do.

We have only genuine Japanese lacquerware, many are decorated with real gold using skilled handwritten maki-e techniques. We hope that you will find something you feel excited to use in our Japanese lacquer sake cups & vessels with an enjoyment of the beauty and the Japanese heritage in your creative life. We take pride in all the lacquerwares we provide as the best in its category. Kogei Styling is an authentic and fine Japanese lacquerware shop online, that you can trust.