urakumado 有楽窓

Keywords
Architecture
Tea Houses

A type of window named for Oda Uraku 織田有楽 (1547-1621) which incorporates short, small, vertical stripes of bamboo placed outside in front of a window called *renjimado 連子窓, and, on the inside, a paper covered window *shōji 障子. The light circulated by the bamboo slits creates a beautiful striped pattern on the shōji

A typical example is found in a tea ceremony room designed by Oda Uraku at Joan tea ceremony house, Joan-no-Seki 如庵の席, in Aichi Prefecture. The window is situated on the wall parallel to the long side of the host's mat *temae datami 点前畳. Dark, purply-brown strips of bamboo, shichiku 紫竹, are used with hardly perceptible spaces between them. However, an alternating pattern of light and dark penetrates to the shōji, unique to a Uraku design.