It's not a coffee table, it's not a tea table, no—it's a chai table, named after that spiced black tea infusion from India. The highly textured cypress top, referred to as "jin-di-sugi" in Japan, was a decorative surface treatment developed by John Bradstreet of Minneapolis. The overall … design concept was inspired by primitive Asian furniture and architecture, especially the rope joinery.

The table also serves as an excellent display platform for sculpture or art pottery, the highly textured surface being evocative of the carefully raked surface of a Zen garden.

Cypress, dyed white oak and rope

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