5x4.5x2 Inch Small Oval Ruri Blue Bushuan Japanese Bonsai Pot #679 – Deep Glaze, Double Chop, Glazed Bottom, Cloud Feet

Cloud feet, which are exactly what the name suggests: feet cut in a rolling, lobed profile rather than a plain block, so the pot appears to rest on something soft. Bushuan used them alongside step-cut feet and terraced bases, and they are one of the details that separates a carved piece from a plain one.

The glaze is a deep ruri blue, and the pot is glazed underneath as well as over. Green is the colour he is best known for, so blue taking the surface is less usual, though the depth comes from the same method as his greens: layer on layer of glaze, fired so it runs and pools rather than sitting flat. A double chop is pressed into the base.

At 5 by 4.5 inches and 2 inches deep this is shohin scale and shallow. It suits a small tree with developed roots, or an accent planting. A blue this deep contrasts with foliage rather than harmonising with it, which can be exactly right for a flowering species and wrong for a conifer.