"Lan Qi Lin" (蓝麒麟), literally "blue qilin," is one of the most prized of the Jianzhan tenmoku glazes. The qilin is the mythical Chinese creature whose body is said to be covered in a fine layer of scales, and the glaze takes its name from how it looks: a deep, near-black ground covered edge to edge in a field of tiny silver pinpricks, so fine and dense that the surface reads at a glance like a layer of animal skin. Where the light catches the pattern, a clear blue iridescence rises up out of the dark, shifting to silver as the bowl turns. The interior shows the pattern most clearly — a small pale eye at the very center, with the pinpricks radiating outward and growing denser toward the rim. The exterior carries the same fine pattern, thinning to a russet tone where the glaze pulls away from the foot.
The bowl takes the Shu Kou (束口, "contracted mouth") form — a Song dynasty classic, with the rim turning gently inward at the top, the kind of shape that holds the tea's aroma close to the drinker. The proportions are small and light in the hand.
Handcrafted in Jianyang, Nanping, Fujian — historically known as Jianzhou or Jian'an — and fired at 1300°C. The bowl is dense in hand and holds heat well; its iron-rich glaze is often said to soften the taste of the tea.
| Capacity |
130 ml |
| Weight |
180 g |
| Height |
5 cm |
| Diameter |
8.5 cm |
Photos are taken of one piece selected at random from each batch. The bowl you receive will carry the same glaze and the same overall pattern, with only very slight differences in the exact placement of individual spots or streaks — a subtle variation, never a drastic change. Slight color differences may also appear due to lighting and screen calibration.
Shipped in a fabric drawstring pouch (cotton-linen outer, silk-floss padding, velvet lining).
See the full Jianzhan collection here.
Note: some bowls carry small smooth sand points on the glaze surface — natural marks left by the firing, very common in wood-fired, traditionally hand-thrown Jianzhan. They are smooth to the touch, with no pits or depressions, do not affect the bowl's use for tea in any way, and are not considered a workmanship defect.
