The contents of the cup were poured into the tea bowl and offered up for me to smell.

BBC: Here be dragons

It produced an intensely Elitist, nobly disciplined and masculine culture whose emblems were the ink brush, the samurai sword and the tea bowl.

CNN: ASIANOW - TIME Asia | The Subtle Magic of Koetsu

Recollections of the SAS invasion strategy were graphically illustrated over the tea table with the cups and saucers, sugar bowl, milk jug and teapot used as landmarks to describe the scene.

BBC: Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady

Koetsu was the first Japanese to sign one of his own tea bowls the famous "Fuji" bowl, now designated a national treasure by the Japanese and hence unable to be shown in the U.S. but he never ran his own kiln.

CNN: ASIANOW - TIME Asia | The Subtle Magic of Koetsu