From a Kunming workshop to your pitcher
When we began testing strainers for the shop, most options failed quickly — mesh that warped, handles that broke, or pours that spilled tea onto the table. We took the search to the hardware districts of Kunming, and found a small metalwork studio run by two brothers who had been making surgical-grade filters for laboratory use. Intrigued by the possibility, we spent three days refining the design with them. The goal: a strainer that could balance on any standard cha hai mouth without tilting, with a mesh fine enough to catch even broken leaf but open enough to preserve pour speed. After six prototypes, they settled on a double-layer stainless mesh laser-welded into a slim rim. The result is the strainer here — 35 grams, no flash, just a tool that disappears into your ritual. Each batch is inspected in Kunming before shipping, including mesh tension and weld consistency. It’s a small object, but it represents the kind of quiet engineering we believe belongs in every gongfu setup.