CHAWAN Collection

SILENCE PLEASE
Silent Matters x Kaikado

Launch:
NYCxDESIGN
16 – 20 MAY 2025
132 BOWERY 2ND FLOOR
NEW YORK, NY 10013

Szkło Studio, CHAWAN Collection Limited Edition 1/10, 2025. Photo credits: Adorno

To celebrate the 150th anniversary of Kaikado—the legendary Kyoto-based maker of handcrafted tea canisters— Silence Please presents a five-day installation of ceremonial performances in its Lower Manhattan tea house. Titled Silent Matters, the experience blends Japanese tea ceremony with contemporary sound, light, and movement. Each performance is designed as a moment of stillness in a city of constant motion. At the heart of the event ADORNO presents a landmark collection of contemporary ceremonial vessels commissioned by 18 progressive ceramicists, reinterpreting the traditional ‘Chawan’ through their distinctive material practices. These limited-edition works—each produced in a series of ten—transcend functionality to become contemplative objects that challenge our perception of ritual implements.

The pieces in CHAWAN are crafted as both functional tea or matcha vessels and sculptural works—objects that invite reflection, slow use, and tactile appreciation. While grounded in the typology of the chawan, they move beyond direct reinterpretation, expressing personal approaches to making that respond to heritage, context, and experimentation. These vessels are suitable for preparing and drinking matcha, serving loose-leaf tea, or simply existing as contemplative elements in a space.

Each designer was invited to explore the chawan form through their established material language—ranging from raw, hand-built clay bodies and refined porcelain to molten glass and hybrid composites. The resulting works are diverse in technique and aesthetic, yet connected through a shared interest in restraint, intimacy, and the sensory dimensions of drinking vessels.

Informed by practices from Europe, Asia, and the Americas, CHAWAN reflects the ongoing relevance of traditional objects in contemporary life. The matcha bowl, in this context, becomes a point of dialogue: between past and present, utility and meaning, presence and absence.

Available exclusively at the Silence Please gallery and online at Adorno.

CHAWAN Collection. Graphic credits: Adorno, Silence Please

Artists:
Agne Kucerenkaite (LT)
Federica Paglia (IT)
Françoise Jeffrey (FR)
Freakleesh (US)
Lucile Gracile (FR)
Luft Tanaka (US)
Melo Clay (UK)
OOG Objects (PL)
Schoemig Porzellan (DE)
Streicher Goods (US)
Studio Berg (DE)
Studio Flore (US)
Szkło Studio (PL)
Vale Ro (NL)
VeromOCERAMIC (EE)
Volupte Studio (ES)
Zeynep Boyan (DE)
Studio S II (US)

Curation: Martin Clausens/ Adorno

Tea master: Yoshitsugu Nagano
Movement direction: Amy Gardner
Soundscape: Amma Ateria
Lighting: Nate Mohler