meibutsugire 名物裂

Keywords
Art History
Crafts

Celebrated fabrics. Cloth chosen and admired by tea adepts and other elites from the 14th to 17th century. Most are *kinran 金襴 (gold brocade), *donsu 緞子 (damask), *kantō 間道 (striped textile), and *nishiki 錦 (Japanese brocade), but meibutsugire also include some sarasa 更紗 (printed cotton). Reportedly there were 400 kinds of meibutsugire, named after the people who collected them, for the places where they were made, for the potters, after the famous objects they housed, or after some historical anecdote. Originally they were called jidaigire 時代裂 (fabrics from ancient times). When they were used for famous tea containers, meibutsu chaire 名物茶入, the fabrics were called meibutsugire. They were also used for the mountings of hanging scrolls and small crepe wrappers *fukusa 袱紗. The famous tea master Kobori Enshū 小堀遠州 (1579-1647) was particularly fond of them and introduced many of these exotic fabrics into the tea ceremony. They were also used for garments of the ruling military class and for Noh costumes *nōshōzoku 能装束. Meibutsugire influenced Japanese dyeing and weaving patterns in textiles.