With sakura season fast approaching in Japan, many are longing to celebrate the country's beautiful cherry blossoms by celebrating with hanami, or flower viewing parties of eating and drinking sitting under cherry blossom trees. While safety protocol during the current pandemic makes that annual custom a little difficult this year, fortunately there's a colorful way to take the sake and sakura parties straight to your home.

Traditional sakazuki (sake cups) that bloom into bright pink sakura when filled with chilled sake.

The elegant saucer-like sake cups are coated with a special paint that reacts to temperature, and when a drink is poured at 17 degrees Celsius or lower, the cherry blossoms appear in full bloom within the sake cup. The pretty design is clever on its own, but is the perfect drinking companion for a home hanami party.

When restored to room temperature, the color of the cherry blossoms fade, representing the fleeting beauty their real life sakura counterparts are often admired for.

Check out the blooming cherry blossom sake cups at grape SHOP.

(We use WorldShopping Global. The grape SHOP page is in Japanese, but if you see the WorldShopping widget appear at the bottom of the page, that product can be shipped overseas)

To match the white sakura sake cups are also a set of black sake cups. While the white cups transform into full bloom sakura when filled with chilled sake, their black counterparts react to hot sake (over 45 degrees Celsius), and show of the brilliant autumn colors (koyo) of Japanese fall leaves.

Check out the brilliant fall leaves sake cups at grape SHOP.

(We use WorldShopping Global. The grape SHOP page is in Japanese, but if you see the WorldShopping widget appear at the bottom of the page, that product can be shipped overseas)

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By - Big Neko.