From Wikipedia,
the free encyclopedia.
Tatami
mats (畳)
(originally meant "folded and piled") are a traditional Japanese
flooring. Made of woven straw,
and traditionally packed with straw (though nowadays sometimes
with Styrofoam), Tatami are made in individual mats of uniform
size and shape, bordered by brocade or plain black cloth.
Tatami were originally a
luxury item for the wealthy at a time when most people had floors
made of dirt.
There are various rules
concerning the number and layout of tatami mats; an inauspicious
layout is said to bring bad fortune. The mats must not be laid in
a grid pattern, and in any layout there is never a point where the
corners of three or four mats intersect.
In
Japan, the size of a room is typically measured by the number of tatami
mats (-畳,
-じょう).
Shops were traditionally designed to be 5 1/2 mats (= 8.91 m2),
and tea
rooms and tea
houses are frequently 4 1/2 mats (= 7.29 m2). The
traditional dimensions of the mats was fixed at 35.5 in
by 71 in by 2 in (90 cm by 180 cm (= 1.62 square
meters) by 5 cm). Half mats, 35.5 in by 35.5 in (90 cm by 90
cm) are also made. Because the size is fixed, rooms in traditional
Japanese construction measure in multiples of 35.5 inches. It
should be noted that mats from Kyoto
and other parts of western Japan are slightly larger than those
from Tokyo
and eastern Japan at 33.5 in by 70.5 in (85 cm by 180 cm = 1.53
square meters).
Six-mat room with tatami
flooring and shoji
Tatami mats are associated
with Japanese religious rites and the tea
ceremony. Most modern Japanese homes still have at least one
tatami room.
