The irori or open pit hearth can still be seen today in the central rooms of old farm houses. Many rustic restaurants too still serve traditional Japanese dishes to guests who cook the food themselves at the irori. Seated on indigo cotton cushions around the old open pit they cook their food in large, hanging iron pots and on sticks thrust into a thick bed of ashes surrounding the sizzling (and smoking) charcoal fire. In centuries past the smoke itself served a worthwhile purpose. It chased the bugs from the thickly thatched roofs. However, modern fire prevention rules prohibit this type of roofing in heavily populated areas today.
The Hibachi, a portable charcoal brazier that has become a favorite of antique collectors in recent years, came to replace the older irori in city dwellings. The large box-type hibachi with a metal liner, often of copper, provided a gathering place for the whole family...tea and meals were served there, mending done, gossip savored and accounts totted. Hibachi of all shapes and sizes were carried from room to room and used principally as hand-warmers. There were called Te-Aburi hibachi.
The hibachi sometimes makes the rooms stifling during the winter, but the insufficient fastening of the sliding doors and sliding windows, which always causes drafts, allows much fresh air to enter, and this is the reason why one never hears of suffocation in Japan in spite of the general use of charcoal fires.
Another of the heating arrangements is the Kotatsu, another city substitute for the old irori. This is a shallow, smaller square pit, either portable or set into the floor, in which charcoal was burned. It was covered by a latticed, wooden framework the size of a small table. Over this a quilt was placed, its size large enough to accommodate the legs of those seated around it. On chilly nights bedding was often warmed over the kotatsu to insure snug night's slumber. Kotatsu are still used widely in modern Japanese homes but electricity has replaced the charcoal fire.
For cold feet, there were two types of portable foot-warmers. The earliest was an Anka, a square wooden box with openings at the top and sides and one sliding door. Through this, an earthen pan containing live balls of charcoal dust could be placed. The box would be then covered with a quilt as with the kotatsu.
The latter foot-warmer, the Yutampo, was much safer although there are tales of a few scorched feet. These can be found in many antique shops. The yutampo was either a metal container or a cylindrical earthenware vessel flattened on the bottom. It was filled with hot water, corked and wrapped in a towel. buried in the depth of the bedding it was a great boon to frigid feet.
Another portable fireplace was the smaller Kairo, a metal container in which powdered charcoal was placed. It was used as a bosom, pocket of tummy warmer and is still widely used in Japan today. The modern Kairo, usually carried in coat pockets to keep one's hands warm, is still a metal container (with a velveteen carrying case) but it is fueled by lighter fluid rather than charcoal. Kaori can be purchased at your nearest drugstore. To activate your hand-warmer just fill the cottn wadding with fluid, light it with a match until it catches and flames, and when the flame dies out replace the lid, put it into its cloth case and pop it into your pocket --- or bosom...or cummerbund. It should keep you warm for at least eight hours!