The Tea Ceremony

Mutara Juko took tea out of the shoin study and into the autonomous teahut. It was he who established the correct size as 4.5 mats. Shoin were much larger spaces, although they might be divided up with screens. The notion of the teahut as an enclosure stems from Juko. 4.5 mats makes a perfect square, but more importantly, in Buddhism, the Ô4.5 squareÕ (hojo) is the name given to an abbacy. It represents an ideal, notional place of retreat from the world, far off in the mountains. It signifies a place of removal from the routine and secular.
The 4.5 mat teahut was JukoÕs brilliant innovation. Takeno Joo also used them too, taking then to be as a symbol of purity. JooÕs tea style was continued by Yamanoue Soji, who added a one-bay extension and a small doorway; he removed the windows and surrounded the hut with greenery in the form of a small garden with a pathway. This is the quintessential teahut. His won universal praise for their materials, proportions and feel, and were widely copied. Rikyu based his own ideas on them.