Cups with swimming carp motifs abound in Taiwan. They are usually cheaply made – very often from China – with mechanically reproduced carps designs that try to imitate a hand-painted one: literally, not our cup of tea! But, when we saw this limited set made by one of our favorite ceramic artists, the beauty and metaphor of making your tea cup a pond in which an inseparable pair of carps would happily swim in your best Taiwanese nectar revealed itself and became quite appealing! These unique conical cups are individually hand-turned one by one so, slight variations in size and shape are to be expected. If you order more than one, we will match similar cups to make a homogenous set. They are then glazed and hand-decorated individually one by one of the most original ceramic artists in Taiwan. Master Zhuang is a reputed award-winning potter from Sun Moon Lake, with whom we have developed a unique working relationship fueled by friendship. We've introduced his work back in 2014 and are now proud to offer an expanded range of his tea ware items this Fall 2018 from which these cups are part of. If it means anything, Yuwen, our resident Tea Master, adopted one of Master Zhuang’s cups as one of her favorite ones back in 2104. If you come to visit, you will most likely see her enjoying her daily tea moments with one of them. Like all the work featured in our Handcrafted section, each item is made one by one and is signed and dated by the artist. Handmade in Taiwan.