Rufford

 Last week-end was the annual pottery festival at Rufford. It's  good place to catch up with old friends and to make new friends. Above is Tim Huckstepp's stand he was my pottery neighbour for the week-end.
Below is my stall. I wish that I'd managed to take more photos as some potters have really thought out their stands to show their work to best advantage.

 Margaret Frith always has a good variety of forms wearing lush glazes.

 Rachel's work is so painterly and subtle. Unfortunately this photo doesn't show the soft colours and beautiful texture of her pots.

 Vivienne Ross adds a touch of humour and delicacy with her work.

Finally Darren Ellis who won the prize for best dressed stall. His pots were rich and earthy but looked very practical. All these potters were in the back courtyard where I was but there were over a hundred potters all together.
You can go to Priscilla Mouritzen and Paul Jessop for more details of the week-end.

 Pots and more pots. Often it can look as though there is little progress in the pottery. Because my work has quite a lot of decoration it is slow to produce but then when I catch up with the glazing work starts to come through the kiln.
These bowls are now ready to come to Earth and Fire at Rufford in a few weeks time.

 This plate is one of several that I have made  where I have tried a different treatment on the rim. Not sure if I will pursue this idea or not. I might try out a few different directions with it.

 I was unhappy with this bowl as when I came to decorate it I could see the throwing lines inside. I usually use a throwing rib to take these out when I throw the bowls but had somehow missed that part of the process on this one. I was just going to sling it into the recycling bin when I thought I'd use it to try a different design. so instead of taking my usual care with it I quickly drew out this owl. I didn't want to spend hours writing around the edge when it might just end up in the bin. But now it's finished I rather like the boldness of the owl.
I have had builders here for over two weeks putting in a new shower room upstairs!! When I showed them these tiles I'd made they volunteered to put them in the down stairs toilet. They are quite uneven but add a splash of colour.

My studio

 I thought you might like to join me in my pottery today. The studio is bijou so you'll have to squeeze in.

 Have a peek into the corner! The laptop is just used as a radio most of the time. I hope you like radio 2 or we might just listen to Alan Bennett's Talking Heads' on Youtube.

 The size of my studio to some extent restricts what I can make as space is so limited.

Look there's yesterday's bowl left out. I have several of these bowls thrown and ready to decorate so I know what I'll be doing for quite a few days.
Lets get on with today's bowl. This was thrown from 2 kilos of clay, slipped and then turned so now it's ready for the decoration.

I'm loosely drawing out the illustration using food colour. I've got some pictures from books and some of my own drawing to work from. I really enjoy drawing onto the leather hard clay with the colour. I don't need a detailed drawing to follow but just a general layout.

 The bowl is wide enough so I can get my hand inside to work on the sgraffito. Sorry lunch has to be a hurried affair as the bowl is drying out. 
By 3 o'clock we can have a break- that's my hot chocolate next to the drawings I'm working from

It's seven o'clock now and we can finish for the day. Time to think about cooking dinner. Only just managed to get that bowl finished!

Fruit platter!

I'd booked tickets to go to the Selvedge Spring Fair for Saturday. So despite the snow we went ahead and made the journey to London. I wish I'd thought to take some photos now as it was very refreshing seeing totally different work. ( All fabric, textiles and knitted things with a very retro feel. Very nostalgic).
We tried to feel more spring like with Penny's fruit platter for pudding when we got home.

Tea Caddy part 2

I've been wanting to experiment with gold lustre for a while. The idea of adding extra layers to the pots appeals to me so I thought I would use the tea caddy to test the idea. Although I think the idea needs more work I like the result. Playing around with new materials is very motivational and I'm keen to go on experimenting.

I've been very fortunate this week to get some work photographed professionally so the credits for these photos goes to Sussie Ahlberg.

Tea caddy

Just recently I thought I would explore some new shapes. At the end of the day when I had really finished work I thought I would throw just one more pot to try a different shape. As it turned out the pot wasn't centred very well and I was about to throw it out when I thought I may as well do some quick sgraffito on it to see how the shape worked. Here is the finished pot. Although the pot isn't very good I think it gives me a really good surface for decorating. I've since thrown some more to work with so I am looking forward to getting out to the studio to draw on them.

Glaze results

 This small 'lake' is about five minutes walk from our house. It's where an old sand pit has been flooded when the excavating was finished. There are several of these close to our home, some quite big and they are now managed as nature reserves. As you can see I am still looking for skeletal plant structures to draw.

Yesterday I had to make a trip into Kent to pick up clay. You know the sort that comes in plastic bags! The two pots above are made from the clay straight out of the clay pit in Kent but I am still having issues with the glaze splintering on this body. I would really like to use this clay more rather than the commercial clay. 
The top jug is glazed with my sesquecilicate glaze and this is the one that is causing me problems. The photo doesn't really show the difference very clearly but the bottom jug is glazed with a commercial glaze. It fits the body well but it looks very cold whereas the other glaze looks very warm and really lets the clay body 'glow'.
The other problem with the commercial glaze is that even if I compromised and decided to use it they no longer make it.
Although I don't do much work in this clay I still am testing for viable solutions so that I could at least do a series of work using it. I've not given up yet and still have some ideas to test.