The great potter Shoji Hamada made pots that were off centre or wabi sabi<\/a> and\u00a0when it was pointed out he\u00a0apparently\u00a0stopped the wheel and asked the person who said it was crooked, “Where?” \u00a0You can’t see the so-called imperfection unless the wheel is spinning. \u00a0If you had a high speed Lazy Susan with the pot placed dead centre then maybe<\/em> you might be able to detect it. \u00a0And who made this rule about hand crafted things having to be perfect anyway?<\/p>\n Hamada and his work.<\/p>\n An unglazed candle lantern that I made demonstrating "wabi sabi."<\/p><\/div>\n The reason for this blog isn’t\u00a0necessarily\u00a0to point out imperfections in hand crafted pottery though. \u00a0The reason I started to write today is because I spend a great deal of time explaining to potential customers – either through email, on the phone or in person how<\/em> my job is done. \u00a0If I can refer them to this blog, that means I get more time in the clay studio!<\/p>\n I suppose a lot of my clients have some idea about how pottery is made but they have a very tiny snapshot of all of the steps involved which, if they better understood they would know why they can’t have it exactly the way they want it<\/em>. \u00a0As much as I would like to have you all ask me to make something for you, you need to know how I roll because my work just may not be what you really want.<\/p>\n The first step in pottery making is working with the clay. \u00a0I like to make pots on the potters’ wheel and also to hand build pottery. \u00a0What’s the difference? \u00a0Well, hand built pots can be more time consuming or less time consuming depending on the pot I choose to make.<\/p>\n From my very beginnings as a potter I have made dinner plates in a mold because it is less time consuming. \u00a0I can make them on the wheel too because some folks like the\u00a0symmetry\u00a0that wheel thrown plates provide, but because the expectation with a stack of dinner plates is that they are all\u00a0the exact same size with the exact same\u00a0size foot ring too,\u00a0wheel\u00a0thrown dinner plates are actually more <\/em>expensive for me to make\u00a0because\u00a0they are far more time consuming considering all the\u00a0measuring\u00a0and fine work that goes into\u00a0matching\u00a0every plate. Hand built dinner plates are far less time consuming because I use a mold, therefore I can make dinner plates at a lower cost for my customers if they are hand built.<\/p>\n I call my dinner plates and sandwich plates CaveWare because they aren’t meant to look perfectly round. \u00a0The edges are hand cut and are purposefully uneven to give them a more artsy look. I used to call them “Flintstone” plates but I thought the Hanna\/Barbera Corp. would be upset with me if I used that name. \u00a0The CaveWare plates stack very nicely because they’re the same size seeing as I made them in a mold. \u00a0My mold of choice? \u00a0Old acoustic ceiling tile material with a hole cut in it. \u00a0I get discards from the lumber store. If the ceiling tile in missing a corner or is water damaged then I get them for a reduced price and sometimes FREE! \u00a0Yay!<\/p>\n Now, the bottoms of the CaveWare plates are not glazed because they do not have a foot ring. \u00a0What is a foot ring anyway? \u00a0It’s that ring of unglazed clay on which the pots sits in the kiln. \u00a0If one were to put glaze on the entire bottom of any pot and fire it, it would be fused to the kiln shelf, so when one makes a piece on the wheel after it dries up for about 3-4 days (depending on the weather and\/or season) it is turned upside down and a foot ring is carved out with a trimming tool.<\/p>\n See the ring of unglazed clay? THAT is a foot ring.<\/p><\/div>\n The bottoms on CaveWare plates are flat and have a good deal of exposed, unglazed clay that could potentially be touching your shiny wood table and possibly scratch it. \u00a0After all it is <\/em>stoneware and there is grog in the clay. \u00a0I use a rubber rib to press the grog back into the bottom\u00a0of the plate, and I sand the plates after they are fired so the yfeel soft as a baby’s bottom, but they can still be a little scratchy, like micro-scratchy. \u00a0For this reason I recommend place mats or a table cloth. \u00a0I can also make plate from porcelain which has no grog in it at all. \u00a0Either way, where else can you get a beautiful hand made (hand built) dinner plate for under $30 unless it’s made by a potter?<\/p>\n Place setting \u2013 10\u201d blue dinner plate (glaze \u2013 blue jeans) with sandwich plate (glaze \u2013 oatmeal) on top. From my own cupboard.<\/p><\/div>\n All of the dishes I’ve seen at The Super Store or Wal-Mart or Canadian Tire simply do no measure up. Those plates are made by machinery; \u00a0possibly glazed by a human. \u00a0I don’t know. \u00a0They are usually made in and shipped from China at a great cost to the environment. \u00a0Do you know what’s in the glaze on those plates? Neither do I, but I know what’s in my <\/em> glaze and I know it isn’t lead.<\/p>\n So getting back to the way pots are made: \u00a0Open box of clay, cut off a piece, wedge it and either hand build with it or throw a pot on the wheel. \u00a0This is the simplified version of how to make a pot. \u00a0My techniques will be show in a future video blog. \u00a0After the pot is made it is covered in a sheet of thin plastic (the type from the dry cleaner’s and thanks to my sister-in-law who collects it for me I have an ongoing supply) and put on the shelf to dry. Depending on the type of clay it is – some types dry more quickly than others – it takes about 3-4 days of drying before I go to the next step. \u00a0Sometimes it’s just 2 days, sometimes it’s 7 days. \u00a0You never know. You just have to keep checking the pots every day to catch them at the right time for the next step.<\/p>\n The next step for a wheel thrown pot is trimming. \u00a0As I mentioned, the pot is turned upside down and trimmed with various types of trimming tools. \u00a0I use the right tool for the job and I use a Giffin Grip which is a tool used to hold the pot on the wheel head as well as centre it at\u00a0the\u00a0same time. \u00a0The CaveWare plates are turned over and the bottoms are smoothed out, the edges are hand cut and I bevel the edge too. \u00a0I give great attention to details.<\/p>\n Trimming my compost jar on the Giffin Grip.<\/p><\/div>\n After trimming the pot it is put up on the shelf once again, covered in plastic and left until bone dry. \u00a0This could take up to 3 weeks especially if it is humid.<\/p>\n Full shelves of pots under plastic.<\/p><\/div>\n After the pots are bone dry I can do a bisque firing. \u00a0The first firing is called bisque taken from the French word “biscuit” as in cookie because the pots resemble the colour of a cookie when they come out of the first firing. Bisque firing to a low-ish temperature of 1970 degrees F means the pots remain porous and ready to accept glaze right into the pores of the piece, but they are strong enough to handle without worrying that they’ll fall apart when taking on the glaze.<\/p>\n Glaze<\/a> can be made up of various clays, silica, a melting component or flux, colourants, sometimes opacifiers and water. \u00a0When a pot that is not bisque fired is dipped into a bucket of glaze, the chances of that peice getting too wet and breaking or cracking is greater than if it is<\/em> bisque fired.<\/p>\n It takes a lot of pots to fill a kiln for bisque firing. \u00a0Because the pots have no glaze on them, I can stack pots on top of pots or inside bigger pots. \u00a0This method is preferred because it saves boat loads of energy plus the more slowly the kiln cools from all those pots being in there, the better the firing.<\/p>\n It takes about an hour or so to load my biggest kiln for a bisque firing. \u00a0In fact, this is what I should be doing right now because I have several orders that I must get out by Monday, so excuse me while I go to the pottery and load my kiln, Big Bert. \u00a0Okay! \u00a0The kiln is loaded and warming up or “candling,” which means it’s heating slowly to 200 F and then I’m letting it stay at that temperature for a few hours to make sure there is no\u00a0moisture\u00a0left in the pots. \u00a0212 F is boiling temperature so you can imagine what would happen to the pot if any water was inside and started to heat to a boil. \u00a0BOOM! \u00a0Hence the reason for candling. \u00a0After candling I get Big Bert going and fire overnight. \u00a0A bisque firing takes about 6-8 hours and then about 24 hours to cool off enough to unload the pots.<\/p>\n Once unloaded each pots gets inspected for cracks and warping. \u00a0If I see either, they get the hammer. \u00a0Both can happen but once you get really good at your job it happens less often. \u00a0I sand each pot to make sure there are no\u00a0unsightly\u00a0bumps or lumps and then I take the pots over to the kitchen and wash them with water (no soap) thoroughly because dust can actually ruin the glaze job on the pot or the entire bucket of glaze can get contaminated with dust and then it has to be disposed.<\/p>\n Once the pots are dry from being washed, which takes about 4 – 6 hours or so because they are porous, I stack them up and take them back to the pottery where foot rings and the bottoms of pots\u00a0get\u00a0an\u00a0application\u00a0of liquid wax resist. \u00a0 The wax\u00a0resists\u00a0the glaze on the pots where I don’t want glaze. \u00a0I use wax resist to decorate some of my pots like this:<\/p>\n The design on these pieces were created by painting on liquid wax before glazing.<\/p><\/div>\n After the wax is applied it takes at least two hours to dry and then I’m ready to glaze the pots.<\/p>\n There is a lot of grunt work that goes on in the pottery. \u00a0It ain’t all fun. \u00a0Jobs vary from mixing and recycling clay<\/a> to cleaning glaze spits from kiln shelves, painting kiln shelves with kiln wash so the shelves stay in good shape firing after firing, cleaning the wheel, tools, scrap clay buckets, glaze buckets, and mixing glazes. \u00a0There’s more but I don’t wanna bore ya. \u00a0I mix glazes when I run low and it doesn’t usually happen on the same day that I glaze. Mixing glazes is fairly labour intensive. \u00a0I use tried and true recipes and it involves carefully measuring each raw material into a bucket of pre-measured water and then letting the materials slake or soak into the water. \u00a0After that I mix it up with a paint mixer on the end of my electric drill and then I\u00a0sieve\u00a0the glaze 4-6 times. \u00a0After each glaze is sieved I must clean the sieve\u00a0thoroughly\u00a0and the spare\u00a0bucket\u00a0as well so I don’t contaminate the next glaze with materials, especially colourants, that I used in the glaze I mixed before. \u00a0Because of the fine particles of the raw materials I must wear a respirator and gloves while doing this job. \u00a0Silica is one material that is often used in glazes and there is silica in clay as well. \u00a0Silica can shred your lungs and cause silicosis or potter’s rot<\/a>. \u00a0I wear my respirator when sanding pots as well.<\/p>\n When I glaze I choose to dip the pots into the bucket of glaze or pour the\u00a0glaze\u00a0onto the pots. \u00a0Sometimes I use multiple glazes and the effects can be very pretty or pretty ugly. \u00a0Before\u00a0sacrificing\u00a0a pot I use a test tile to test new combinations of glazes.<\/p>\n Glazes aren’t like paint. \u00a0Paint can be easily tinted. \u00a0Think about your last trip to the paint store. \u00a0Perhaps you’ve heard about a potter who “paints” glaze onto a pot. \u00a0They’re probably using underglaze or overglaze to “paint” a design on a pot. Majolica<\/a> ware is like that and while I admire the technique I’m personally not<\/em> interested in painting on a pot. \u00a0I prefer to work with the wet clay body and I like to use wide swaths of colour and minimal decoration. \u00a0 In the photo below I have dipped the entire jug into one glaze and then taken a damp sponge and wiped back the glaze to expose the texture.<\/p>\n Cool texturing technique taught to me by my clay mentor Kevin Kushnier. <\/p><\/div>\n So getting back to the paint thing – glazes aren’t easily changed to suit your individual taste. \u00a0A customer who would like to choose a glaze colour should be aware that it isn’t as easy as choosing a paint colour. \u00a0You know, you go to the paint store and pick out a colour from a paint chip and the clerk gets some white paint and adds tint.\u00a0\u00a0That’s easy peasy compared to changing or creating a glaze, so when I get someone asking me for a lighter shade of blue or telling me that they want a nice pinkish gray – something that is not already in my glaze pallette, well unless you have a couple of years to wait while I test a new glazes in between making pots for shows and for paying customers, it probably isn’t going to happen. \u00a0I make new glazes when I have time to do so and then extensive testing goes on before I will use it on a pot that will be sold. \u00a0I have to test it for durability, chemical leeching, how it fires on each of my clay bodies – and I presently use 3 different clay bodies…make that 4. \u00a0Right now I’m thinking of making a glossy black glaze and I’ve been thinking about that for about 3 years.<\/p>\n I usually give myself a 4 – 7 days to glaze a load of pots, but I often times have to pull several 12-14 hour days in a row if I have a deadline. \u00a0Once the pots are all glazed and the foot rings are cleaned up (sometimes even with wax resist small beads of glaze can stay on where I don’t want it) and the textured pots are wiped back, I can start to load the kiln. \u00a0Loading a glaze kiln is a bit more tricky than a bisque. \u00a0None of the glazed pots can touch because they will fuse together if they do. \u00a0I have glazes that fire well at the very top and very bottom of the kiln (the “cool” spots) and I have glazes that fire well in the middle (the hot spot) and glazes that fire well just above the bottom and just below the top. \u00a0So it’s like a jigsaw puzzle sometimes and it has taken me years to get this down.<\/p>\n With the kiln loaded I candle it for a couple of hours or until I feel no more moisture coming from the freshly\u00a0glazed\u00a0pots inside. \u00a0I use a very scientific method to\u00a0determine\u00a0this: \u00a0a mirror. \u00a0If the mirror steams up, it’s still wet inside. \u00a0When it’s finally dry, I turn up the kiln and let the computer controller do its thing, usually over night. \u00a0When I wake up the next day it’s well before the end of the firing which takes on average 12 hours. \u00a0I watch for the pyrometric cones to melt exactly the way I want them. \u00a0Telling you about pyrometric cones is a blog for another day, but suffice it to say that I keep a careful watch on my cones and when they melt just right, the kiln gets turned off and then I wait for 24 – 36 hours for the kiln to cool down before I can open it to see what treasures are inside.<\/p>\n Kiln opening fall 2010<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Have you ever watched some one throw pots or blow glass, dance or draw? They make it look so easy, don’t they? Well, I’m here to tell you it’s not. It looks easy because dedicated artists have had so much … Continue reading ![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blog.lablanchepoterie.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/hamada.jpg\" "\\"hamada\\"")
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