Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan

The Room That Gave the School Its Other Name

The Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan (武者小路千家茶室官休庵, Kankyūan) is a tiny tea room of one guest mat and a three-quarter host's mat at the Mushakoji Senke tea school in Kamigyō Ward, Kyoto City; the present building was rebuilt by Yukōsai in 1926 and registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 8 November 2004.

A single-storey timber structure with a building area of just 11 square metres, the Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan is attached to the east side of the main house's northern wing. It recreates the room favoured by the school's founder, Ichiō Sōshu, and its name has spread from this one room to the school as a whole.

A Name, and a Room Rebuilt Again and Again

Tradition says Ichiō planned the room with his father, Sen Sōtan, and that Sōtan gave it its name. A board inscribed "Kankyū" in Sōtan's hand hangs in the room.

What the name meant is not certain. The characters read roughly "office" and "rest." A eulogy written in 1774 for the hundredth anniversary of Ichiō's death, by Shingan Sōjō of Daitokuji, took it to mean that Ichiō had given up an official post to devote himself to tea. The school itself reads it as the retreat of a man who had left his post as tea master to the Takamatsu domain.

Kankyūan burned in three fires, in the An'ei, Tenmei and Kaei eras, and was rebuilt each time. After the fire of 1772 it was back in place two years later, in time for Ichiō's centenary. The building you would see today is the one Yukōsai, who revived the lapsed house, rebuilt in 1926.

Why It Was Registered: The Board Between Guest and Host

The Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan was registered as a building that has become a model of its type, and the Agency for Cultural Affairs starts with its plan. Between the one-mat guest area and the three-quarter host's mat (daime) runs a strip of plain board 5 sun 2 bu wide, about 15.8 cm. The Agency calls this layout unique.

In a room of ichijō daime, one mat and a daime, guest and host sit almost knee to knee. One narrow board is enough to give each of them a little space, which is exactly how the school describes its purpose.

Entering by the host's door, you step onto a half-mat of boarding. The hearth is cut into the front of the host's mat, and a small alcove sits at the lower end beside it. The alcove post is straight-grained cedar shaved to an octagon and polished; the alcove rail is a polished cypress log.

What to Look For: Windows, Ceilings, Roof and Ichiō's Basin

According to the Agency, the Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan has two lattice-backed Shitaji-mado windows on the east, the crawl-in guest entrance, or Nijiriguchi, with another lattice window on the south, and a Mizuya preparation area to the north. The school adds a slatted window above the nijiriguchi and a small window behind the host's utensils. For a room this small, light comes in from a surprising number of places.

The ceiling is of woven cattail (gama) held by white bamboo battens, and over the boarded entry it changes to a ceiling that slopes down with the eaves. The preparation cupboard, designed to be easy even for older hands, has two doors of knotted cedar board, behind which sit a slatted bamboo sink and shelves.

The roof is tiled in Sangawara-buki pantiles, but the verges and eaves are finished in Kokerabuki, thin wooden shingles, so the edges read light rather than heavy. In the front garden stands a stone basin carved from a Kamakura-period four-sided Buddhist stone, said to have been a favourite of Ichiō.

Viewing the Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan

The Mushakoji Senke Tea Room Kankyuan is not open to the public and cannot be visited. It sits deep inside the compound on the north side of the main house, so it cannot be seen from Mushakōji-dōri, where only the gate and boundary wall are visible.

Kankyūan is a working tea room, still used for the school's gatherings and lessons. Photographs of the interior appear on the tea-room pages of the school's official website.