Twelve months in the new studio. What’s kept us going?
Studio: a year
Biscuits, clashing knitwear, lemon drop Martinis, gyoza, label makers, coffee, more biscuits, hummus, wheelbarrows, studio dogs that refuse to be studio dogs, open day sausages, and teams.
Fuelled by biscuits, and a fair bit of hope, we moved to our new location on Butterley Street in October 2020. Local restrictions were biting at our heels but we successfully completed 293 appointments. Some little, some large; doesn’t really matter - they all count.
A change of plan in November. We raced to make planters from clay remnants, tested slips and glazes, hosted a raffle, we made more e-courses and revealed our bloopers. We hurried along batches of tenmoku mugs before finally conceding our Standard Ware pots would not be ready for Christmas. It didn’t matter, you know what happened next… We pause to conserve resources, and wrap up.
Lemon Drop Martinis became the cocktail of December 2020. Although closed, we were open, quiet but busy, and the night before Christmas (almost but not quite). Something began stirring with House of Fu...
In January we wondered what a Gyoza making machine might look like while making our own by hand. It was very cold at the studio. We were thankful for what we had. In the midst of prototyping pots and developing glazes we raised £1150 selling pourers for Simon on the Streets. We fired work for members, planned our summer programme and devised our Community Memberships.
For the first three months of the year we waited - a lot - for utility companies. We gave up. We still don’t have a landline. Chris threw pots, and more pots. We opened disappointing kilns and happy kilns, but mostly they were disappointing. The label printer cheered us up and was put to great use dispatching seconds and samples, TubeClay, and labelling buckets!
Dark, dark coffee - dark, dark March… & the realisation that whatever happens next we're leaning into May looking forward - celebrating.
Talk turns back to biscuits as we tweak our mug bodies and handles. Will the standard ware mug take the AeroPress and a chocolate digestive ? No! The low mug was conceived. Members were back, private classes were back, and our first Kickstart placement joined the team. We hacked together lots of tools and aprons.
I promised Chris a lockdown BBQ and in May finally delivered. We geeked out on hummus. Hosted our first city wide event in 18 months, our second Kickstart placement joined the team, classes were back on track; and our lush sinks were installed.
It’s all about the pots. In June, we delivered our pots to House of Fu, launched our new Standard Ware collection, and crack on with a hefty teaching schedule.
Anxiety rises while juggling a pottery, a life, and a house move. Our studio dog, that refuses to be a studio dog, kept things sweet in July with cuddles and walks.
Buttons, spoons, and throwing off the hump for August - our first in person event for 21 months, followed by a bit of much needed annual leave for everyone.
Better still, in September we manage our first whole team meeting in five years. Jo Woffinden and Rebecca Appleby become our handbuilding tutors, our third and fourth Kickstart placements join the team, and I’m released to focus on our community, and development.
Dipping bowls for House of Fu
Tips: bisc
Alongside edible biscuits we handle a lot of bisc. Bisc is fired pottery ready to receive glaze. The literal meaning of biscuit is baked twice. Biscuit is a low temperature firing - typically ranging 850°C-1000°C. The ware hardens sufficiently to become easy to handle but remains porous ready to receive glaze. Sunken Studio’s biscuit firings are 950°C.
An unfired pot can become many other pots and we encourage everyone who makes pots at Sunken Studio to consider if pieces need to be fired. To become a great maker requires practice, only by making many pots will you get better. We encourage lots of making, and we encourage lots of recycling.
Discover: unfired
Clare Twomey’s pieces often utilise unfired clay, many of her works disappear or perish during the exhibition period.
http://www.claretwomey.com/
Clare Twomey, Consciousness/Conscience
Feedback: Start exploring Surfaces
I just wanted to say how much I loved the Start exploring surfaces course with Rebecca. Rebecca’s enthusiasm for the subject was so infectious. The teaching made the course so much fun, I think we all said how great it was as an adult to be given the chance to play and explore in the first classes rather than be thinking about a finished piece. Her ideas and knowledge gave you so many ideas to think about to hopefully explore in future. Also it was great to do something outside my comfort zone and try techniques I would never have explored on my own. My final pieces were something I would never have normally produced. Really just wanted to say how wonderful it was!”
Cat, Sept 2021, test piece: start exploring surfaces