I’m off on a new adventure into clay with you. I’m older, and so are you, and our lives lead us in new directions. I’ve found many of my favorite customers now need pots to serve one or two, instead of the previous family of 4 or 5, so you’re going to see some smaller pieces designed for your life style. And more time to do custom work if you want. So I’ll truly become “your potter”….. just like CSA farmers are “your farmer”.
I’ll Have the Freedom to “Who Knows — We’ll See”
There are a lot of steps to making pottery…. we once counted twenty-plus. At any one of those steps something can go wrong. And when it does, you go back to the starting line. And obviously, that takes time. I can throw a small bowl, have it dry and trimmed in 1-2 days, bisque (first) fired in 2 days, glazed in a day and in the final firng if one is scheduled in 2 more days. It isn’t just one pot, but the kiln mist be filled with some 25-35 other pots.
How often does that happen? Never. And if it’s a pot I’ve never made before, it might 3 or 4 times through the make…dry….trim…dry…fire…. phase. And then if the glaze does something goofy, you go back to day one. That precise sequence happened 3 times on some “cell phone amplifiers” I made last Christmas. Good thing I like a challenge.
So What Now?
At Clay Coyote, I mostly just made and trimmed the pots. Someone else helped us through the first firing; Candi, Micehele, Nancy, Jessica, … who else? Betsy did the glazing and final firing, a whole separate part of the process way harder than the simple making of the pots which had relatively few variables. She is a master at the detail oriented, trial and error process, that it takes to be a master glazer. We once dreamed of getting into brush-work, took a class and realized that was another whole lifetime to learn.
So it’s taken almost 2 years to learn a new kiln, develop glazes and how to glaze. Almost 4 years out from leaving Coyote; as of July 2020, I’ve had 3 kiln loads in a row, under real control, predictable. repeatable. That gives me 4 repeatable glazes, and a jillion practice pots as I got my “hands” back. (If you’ve ever had “put your hand in a table saw” on your bucket list, take it off, you don’t need to do that, but if you insist go to Tracy Kayan, Plastic Surgeon.
Your vinegar pots are lovely! Do you include a spigot and are they replaceable? Is the vessel leakproof (no offense intended, I just had to ask 🙂 And finally, do you have a source for a good red wine mother?
Keep up the good work!
Lin
Hi Lin, Sorry about being slow getting back to your questions yesterday.
Thanks for your comments. I got into vinegar crocks a bunch years ago = at Paula Wolfert’s urging. We started wanting to use a nice wood or = brass spigot. Wood got quickly clogged with the vinegar mother which = brews throughout the pot including the inside of the spigot. The vinegar = will attack any metal spigot, so we ended up with a standard NSF listed = polyethylene spigot and it works as well as possible and is cleanable.
I test them all before they leave here, but recommend you double check = before starting a batch. If you need one, I can send a bit of the = mother I have used for years now.
If you’re thinking about one, let me know as I=E2=80=99ll have to glaze = and fire one. See glazes on=20 http://www.newclaypottery.com/glazes/ . I’ve included the instruction sheet I = did up. And I’m available to answer any questions you might have, and am = thinking about starting a Facebook Group page so people can exchange = experiences.
Thanks for you inquiry and questions.