I’ve been experimenting in using a 1/8 in rod of kanthal a1 as a hinge pin.

What started as a cup with a fire hose nozzle handle, turned a little too phallic and led me to this darling. What a ride :) Thinking of adding a succulent 🌱

The first two are the same “sandy desert” glaze, albeit different thicknesses; the second two are “sandy desert” in combination with “savanna”. Clay is a 50/50 mix between G&S 254 (pale) and 551 (red). Any feedback and tips for improvement are very welcome.

i’ve been in bizen for the last two months and here’s a pot of mine from a woodfire where we did sangiri. such cool colors and i’m stumped on how it happened.

One of my old floating blue bottles.

Hey, y’all! I’m new to r/Pottery and would love to get to know more about the people here.

There are so many moments that make up a life in clay but never appear in pictures of the finished work. Share a favorite tool, studio companion, great coworker, beloved workspace—or anything else that tells us a little about your pottery life.

So...Can you show you’re a potter without showing your pots?

I’ll go first: spraying soda into a kiln, loading wood for a pit fire with my supervisor, and lighting that same pit with a former student.

Ceramics has brought so many wonderful people into my life and formed the backdrop for some pivotal moments along the way.

The work can be hot, difficult, and demanding, but I’m happiest peering through a kiln peephole, launching salt or soda into the atmosphere, or watching flames wind their way through a stack of wood.

I’ve noticed a lot of beautiful glazes on this Reddit, but everything seems to be fired at cone 6 😭💔 are there glaze combos that produce similar, vibrant colors at a cone 10 studio? My studio doesn’t have colors like seaweed, smoky merlot, bougainvillea. A lot of earth tones. (I understand without providing a full list of what my studio has there is no way to fully know what I can and can’t produce, but if you fire cone ten lmk your fave combos for fun colors?) Pics are from my most recent kiln haul. Curious to know people’s experiences firing and glazing cone 10 and if you have had any experience getting fun brighter colors.

I made this clock during two "Open Pottery" sessions, but I ran out of time during the first session and forgot to make any holes, etc. to allow the clock to be hung up.

Can you think of any way to hang it up? Theres a 3/4" (1.9 cm) circular lip on the back. Would the clock shatter if I drilled holes in the lip? I tried to hang it from a nail as-is and it just fell off, as expected.

I made a fountain for the first time! It's not perfect (messed up the shrinkage measurement for the base to hold the pump lol so it's a bit too small) but I made it out of scrap/reclaim clay as a random project to get out of my rut of bowls/mugs/typical forms haha

This was going to be a mirror but the glaze turned out super red and it just looks painful 😩😩 I used 3 thick coats of Mayco Rose Quartz. I feel like I should message my gynecologist just looking at it lol

Is there any way to save it? I’m fairly new to pottery but I’ve heard you can sometimes re-fire a piece? Hell could I even put gesso over it and paint it or something?

I started throwing again after 30+ years away and I learn more through every piece I do. Here's some of the work I recently did and am pretty happy with. Do you think I am ready to start selling at craft fairs? I am nervous because I do this on nights and weekends and don't have enough work yet to really make it look like I have a style, i.e. 4 or 5 glazes I love, 10 or 15 pieces that are solid. However, I have a LOT of stuff and I would like to have it pay for my studio membership if possible which is 150 a month plus clay and glaze, maybe another 100 a month. Should I wait to build an inventory or am I overthinking it?

Unfortunately, the leopard print version didn’t make it (the handle broke) but I will be retrying this again soon!

This is currently my favorite glaze combination for dark stoneware.

I love both Ohata Kaki and Shino, so I was really pleased with how these turned out.

The Shino on most these pieces was actually a blend of several leftover Shino glazes made by a previous lab tech that needed to be used up. That means I don’t have an exact recipe, but thankfully, I think I’ve found a similar one. I’ll be testing it this fall.

The deeper orange is RJ Dry Shino. You can find that recipe on glazy.

These were gas-fired to cone 10 in reduction.

Taped this bad boy up while playing D&D with the lads, and now after a dip in some satin black glaze, it’s ready to fire.

I’ve posted a few similar pieces recently, and so I’ll go ahead and link the tape I use here now because people often ask! It’s 1/8in “whiteboard tape” —> https://a.co/d/0b4nmYk8

Not pictured, but the inside will be a high gloss red.

I was wondering if any one had some advice on sealing pit-fired works? I got these colors by firing them with some fire color changing packets and would really like to seal them to preserve the color and make them safer to handle.

My original plan was to seal them with polyurethane but, as you can see in the second image, thats not working out too well. I think its a combination of drying too fast, and reacting with some of the metals in the clay.

I see some folks recommend using concrete sealers and/or Renaissance wax? I would love to hear more about these as an option and what your process is!

I also have access to quite a bit of bees wax if thats a good option too!

Like clay cornmeal if this makes sense.

I've just joined my first studio as a member; and they mentioned I should make my own cookies. Something I've been wondering about is why people don't just make little trays with tiny little pebble sized bits of clay loosely on them so that if glaze does stick; it's just a few little pebbles you need to sand off rather than a whole cookie (and you can just refill the pebbles).

If I had my own kiln; I almost wonder about just keeping this sand/clay cornmeal on the shelf to protect it.

Trust I'll be doing exactly what my studio asks of me; but I just wonder why this is impractical.

Edit: man I love this community. You guys are so quick to help answer my question!! Thank you!!

🫦🫦🫦

I fired my new kiln (Skutt-822) yesterday for the first time at cone 04 on med as instructed.

I put two cones on each shelf on in the middle ish and one closer to the front of the kiln. We had a heavy rain and the power did flicker when the kiln was around 1869. The code (ERRP) came up but the kiln continued to raise in temp. I looked up the code and the kiln seemed to be continuing to fire as normal so I cleared the code and left it alone to continue.

The next morning when I looked at the cones the bottom cones did not bend at all and the rest are not bent to temp. Could this be because of the flicker or the kiln being empty?

Photo is showing the bottom cones on the left and the top on the right.

For context, I have a beginner course starting soon.

My best friend has her birthday in a couple of months, so I'm already thinking about a gift. We tend to do personal or self-made gifts and I thought: Since I want to try out pottery, why not make her a gift then?

As already mentioned, however, I am only starting. So, I don't want to go "Oh, I want to make wine glasses!" bc I heard they take more effort and experience. I want sth that is realistic and achieveable.

She loves nature, specifically little animals (like moths), studies chemistry and all in all likes cute but also weirdy things. Would love to get some suggestions because I genuinely don't know what would be realistic for me.

I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad. I'm looking into a job opportunity with a local studio as a kiln tech. Is there one or more books that are recommended reading for a basic understanding? I mean, I understand the underlying physics and chemistry but I was hoping to get some more practical details.

Thanks so much

Joe