Describe a piece of furniture in your home that you like

I'd like to describe a kotatsu, which is a kind of traditional Japanese table. Maybe some people don't know it, so I explain. It is a low wooden table, and under the table there is an electric heater. In winter we put a thick blanket between the frame and the table top, so the heat stay inside and your legs are warm.

It is in our living room, next to the door to the balcony. Our apartment in Sendai is not so big, so the living room is also where we are eating. Actually this kotatsu was my grandmother's one, and when she moved to a care home my parents took it.

We use it nearly every day from November until March. We eat dinner at it, I do my homeworks there, and my father watch the TV with his legs under the blanket. Our cat also loves it, she sleeps inside the whole day. To be honest, sometimes I fall asleep there too, and my mother gets angry because she says I will catch a cold.

I like it because it is very cosy and it saves money, because you don't need to heat all the room. But the main reason is that it makes everybody stay together in one room, so we talk more in winter than in summer.

The piece of furniture I'm fondest of is our kotatsu. For anyone who hasn't come across one, it's a low wooden table with an electric heater fixed to the underside, and in winter you lay a thick quilt over the frame and put the tabletop back on, so the warmth is trapped underneath and you sit with your legs tucked inside.

It's in the main room of our flat in Sendai, right by the sliding door onto the balcony. The flat's quite small, so that room is where we eat, watch TV and basically live. It actually belonged to my grandmother, and when she moved into a care home a few years ago, my parents brought it here rather than give it away.

From about November to March it's the centre of everything. We have dinner round it every evening, I tend to do my coursework there because my bedroom's freezing, and my dad watches the baseball with the quilt pulled up until his chest. Our cat practically lives under it. The danger is that it's far too comfortable, so it's very easy to doze off, which my mother says is how you catch a cold.

I think I like it so much because it's so practical. You only heat the space you're sitting in, so it costs a fraction of what heating the whole flat would. But more than that, it brings us together. In summer we all drift off to our own rooms, whereas in winter nobody wants to leave the kotatsu, so we end up chatting for hours.

If I had to choose one piece of furniture I'd hate to be without, it would be our kotatsu. It's a very Japanese thing: a low table with a small heater built into the underside, and in the colder months you drape a heavy quilt over the frame before putting the top back on, so the warmth stays trapped around your legs.

Ours sits in the middle of the living room of our flat in Sendai, a metre or so from the balcony door, on a square of rug that's faded from years of sunlight. It originally belonged to my grandmother, and when she went into a care home, my mother couldn't bear to part with it, so it came to us.

For five months of the year it's essentially what the whole household revolves around. We eat round it, I spread my laptop and notes across it in the evenings because my room's like an icebox, and my father falls asleep under it with the television still on, which my mother insists is the quickest way to come down with something. The cat, meanwhile, disappears underneath in November and only comes out to eat.

What I love about it is partly that it's so efficient: you're only warming the little pocket of air around your legs, not an entire room. But the real reason is that it gathers people. In summer everyone retreats to their own corner of the flat, whereas once the kotatsu is plugged in, nobody can be bothered to get up, so conversations that would otherwise never happen just carry on late into the night.