Round 2! Ding ding

So here are the finalists in the "Postcard Idol" competition, after a crazy voting session last week it was too close to call on some. Down to the final four, please place your votes............now.
1. Baluster jugs.

2. Harlequin mugs.

3. Detail of Oak Tree Harvest jug.

4. mug group ( I really need a better name for these mugs, ideas welcome.)

Etching.

I haven't done much in the way of print making since I was at uni on my foundation course but I do vaguely remember the smell of the melted ground and the acid bath. I remember liking the whole process of it but for the life of me couldn't have told you what that process was - until tuesday there. You might remember a few months back Lisa Hooper came and decorated a jar of mine with some sgraffito curlews, it was beautifully done. Lisa is a print maker and I was saying how much I would like to do some more and she invited me over to her studio for a day. So eventually this week I went, she's over in the Machars to the west of the region, on the coast in the pretty seaside village of Port William. That's my finished plate above.

So I got my little square of zinc (I think it was zinc) and I had a couple of sketchbooks with me but hadn't really thought about what to put on the etching so I opted for some of my favourite pots, both things that are mine and things that are in my virtual collection and here they are in the acid bath being etched.

The inked up plate waiting to be cleaned off.

And a couple of prints off the plate. I'm itching to do some more, I loved it. What a change from how I usually work. There is a print studio down in Dumfries that you can join and use and I think I am going to have to do that now as I want to try printing some more off this plate but I want to make some more too. Greedy I know but it's a lovely way to work and I usually draw or work in 2D so very rarely that this is a great change.

I was telling someone about it today and they asked what I'd drawn on the plate - yes Steven it's you I'm talking about, he said he hadn't realised that I really really liked pots until I told him what I had drawn. He knew I liked pots but not that I really really liked pots. Bless him. Welcome to the potters' world.

Here we snow again

Some new ovally dishes slipped this morning.

There was a small hint of possible snow in the forecast last night but I wasn't expecting to wake up to a good 4inches of snow and it still coming down by the bucket load. My thighs are sore from cycling through it to work, it took me ages but it was great and the only fall I had was a very soft landing. At times there was a pile of snow collecting on the bottom bracket because it was that deep.

Same place as I took that evening picture the other night.

I took a deep breath this afternoon and slipped some tiles that have been ordered for behind Dave and Sue's aga. They have been sat in clamps of wooden boards for a good couple of months now, my thinking with tiles is slow as slow as slow and hopefully they'll warp less.

So here's it's progress you two. What do you think?

It's awkward reaching to the top bits, I couldn't pull my table out far enough to be able to walk around the whole thing so some stretching was required.

I think I might go back to it with some sgraffito details too but I haven't decided yet.

Tomorrow I will tell you about a day out I had yesterday but until then I am shattered. Nightie night.

Sunny weather sunny pots.

The view from the bird hide on Lamb Island up in the river near here. There were no birds hiding in there though, there never are unless it's just that I never see them and they are doing an amazing job at hiding and making themselves look like wooden benches.

Big bowl out of the kiln, more brushed slip and some love apples.

This is the way that you get to Lamb Island, over an old railway bridge.

New plate and some new oval dishes in the back ground there that I forgot to photograph. It's been a busy old day today. Packing up pots that will be delivered to the Forestry Commission at Glentrool tomorrow just in time for their visitor centre to reopen for the season. They keep a display of my pots there throughout the season. It's a fabulous place to visit, especially if you want to get out into the Galloway hills.

The view on the way home tonight.

The people's choice

It feels like only a couple of weeks ago I was asking this question but I have next to no postcards left which means I must have met an awful lot of people last year or else I have some postcard eating creatures in my workshop. The later isn't entirely impossible but hopefully isn't the case as now that they've nearly run out of cards they might start on my accounts next and then we would be in one heck of a mess. So which do I pick? I want a normal postcard again, maybe something else later in the year but just a 6"x4" card for now which rules a couple of these images out unless I have a border too. Anyway let me know what you think, I haven't a clue yet so all thoughts welcome.
1. Legged jugs (better names welcome too).


2. Owl plate.

3. Mug group.

4. Outline bowls.

5. Harlequin mug group.

6. Harlequin bowl group.

7. Baluster jug group.

8. Oak Tree Harvest Jug, detail.

Rocks and Glass

The first issue of Craft&Design magazine with my diary piece in is now out, hasten to your local news agent and snap up a copy quick smart. I got a copy this afternoon, I haven't read it, feels a bit weird but the pictures look good. It's time to start thinking about the next issue already, the deadline is looming closer. Amanda is in it too, she out does me with three pages to my two but I think I'll let her off just this once.

Crispy morning with low sunshine and general lovely but coldness. Beautiful.

Speaking of Amanda, I went to her workshop today for a long awaited visit to carry on my glass trials. I have been cutting coloured glass to layer onto a clear sheet which will next be fused together in the kiln to form a solid sheet before I go back and attack it with some grinding tools. It's odd working with glass. So very very different, as it is at the moment it bears no resemblance to my materials at all. It's hard and cold and sharp but at the same time strangely satisfying when you draw across it with the cutting tool giving barely a scratch in the surface and then "snap" and it breaks were you asked it to - mainly.

Anyhow this sheet above is how I left it and it'll be softer edged and one sheet next time I see it, all being well. Looking forward to grinding it, I enjoyed that the last time I did any. Not entirely sure what it's based on though we were talking about Hutton's Unconformity and conchoidal fractures while we were working so maybe there's some bedding plane influence there.

Lovely evening light too tonight and now it's back to somewhere way below freezing but the stars are out and the moon is a gorgeous crescent.

Monday

The beasties are finished now. The top two are oil drizzlers and the two in the piture underneath are money boxes.

Lots of new pots in the workshop at the moment, it's becoming a bit crowded in there - again. This morning it took me a good few hours to unpack a new pile of acquired pottery bits and bats and get all the new pots into homes and pack up a couple of parcels that are going off in the next couple of weeks. Premature I know but it meant that once they were away I'd have a bit more space to work in.

This is the shelf above my desk at the moment.

Valentine's day yesterday, I couldn't resist making this for Paul, Victoria sponge, yummy (ok partly it was for me too).

Seven Year Itch

Friday again, feels like it's been a long time coming this week. Unpacked another glaze kiln this afternoon and some more pots that I like a lot lot lot have come out, I didn't have much time at the end of the day to photograph them for you, turned into a bit of a rush to get packed up and home in the end after quite a gentle meander through the earlier parts of the day. Got a telling off from a customer who appeared late on in the afternoon because he had been trying to ring for nigh on an hour but the phone was engaged. Oops, that'll be because me and Doug were setting the world to rights - again! Good to chat Doug.
The jugs above are very much inspired by some that I saw in the Museum of London almost exactly a year ago. It's taken me that long to make them in the way that I wanted them to look. I've tried a couple of times but these are by far my faves, in fact the other attempts didn't even get to the handling stage never mind the rest of the journey.
Speaking of anniversaries and journeys, I forgot to mention it on the day but I did think about it on wednesday, the 10th was 7 years since starting my business so as a result I think I'll go try my hand at being a blacksmith instead. I fancy knocking ten bells out of a lump of metal for a change. Anyway yes I always remember that date, sticks in my mind, seven years is a long time really, it's incredible how much can happen in that time. Phew, makes me dizzy even starting to think about it all.

Hoolet plate, I like him, he's a little heavy, his rim is maybe thicker than it needs to be but I was still a little unsure with these wide rims and just how much they can cope with when they get slipped though I brushed the slip on so there wouldn't be as much trauma involved in that as there would be in pouring it. He's got a great powerful stare I think.

eek, very blurry picture, that's how much of a rush I was in, speeding along to the next thing. Sorry about that.

Almost lost the camera taking this picture. I liked the reflection and reached for the camera thinking, hmmm better not drop it now as I dropped it, it bounced off the rim and hit the floor for about the nine millionth time in it's life and yet another tiny screw disappeared from the casing. It is now fetchingly held together with masking tape, tells a tale of a hard life.

Linda Bloomfield sent me this link to another blog post this week. You need a bit of time to sit down and read it but whether or not you agree it's an interesting meander through the world of British tableware.

Dark Skies

Well I rode home at half past five and I didn't need my light son it was still so light. Spring is litteraly just around the corner. Tonight outside it is clear and crisp and the sky is incredible. If it wasn't so cold I'd still be stood out there ogling the stars. You can see the milky way tonight. It's splendiforous. You can get lost in it just staring up there. Galloway recently was named the first Dark Sky Park in the UK. Tonight tells you exactly why.

Behind bars

It's not that they are dangerous that we keep them behind bars, it's for their own safety. Such delicate little mites.

So here's some pictures from Designs, sorry the photography isn't too great, just quick snaps as per usual.

A few things to catch up on this week with blogs and websites to tell you about if you haven't found them already. Philip Leach started a blog a couple of weeks ago now that I have kept meaning to point you too but have until now not managed to do. Philip aka "The only slipware Leach". Great chap, had some good fun down in Devon with him and the gang the year before last.

Then there's the another great chap, Paul Young, who has stepped boldly into the 21st century with a very nice website. I believe a lot of persuading and cajoling was necessary but he's done it. Very smart, lots of pictures of his fab pots and just in time for his appearing at Ceramic Art London in a couple of weeks time.

Finally a picture of a pot that according to the slip trailed date on the side I made in 2003. This is something I made during my apprenticeship and this weekend after all these years I finally got the wicks in place and the thing filled with oil. It's three individual hollow rings which are reservoirs for lamp oil and each ring has four birds on it each of which are lamps, then there's big daddy lamp on the top. The slight problem is that as there are so many lamps it gives off one heck of a heat so we only lit three at the one time. Didn't want to set the fire alarm off you know. It was a heck of a thing to make let alone make wet with a layer of slip. I think I made a dozen but there was only ever this one slipped one that survived and I think there were a couple came through that I intended to use for tin glaze majolica but never got around to it. Makes for a talking point though I think people sitting opposite each other at our little table would struggle to have a conversation for it being in the way.

Yummy little mugs and friendly beasties

I unpacked a kiln this morning, the first finished pots of 2010. I haven't been so excited about unpacking a kiln in ages, partly because I haven't in fact unpacked a kiln in ages and partly because everything in there was new and exciting and lots of new things tried. I was a bit giddy this morning.

Here are the other two monsters from my collection, thought they'd bring a smile to your face, especially old droopy on the left there.

Slab bird dish with brushed on slip, I made this one just before Christmas. I am very excited about the brushed slip, must play some more with that.

The wall behind my wheel is full of plates now, I like it like that though it does mean I have to be especially careful mounting my wheel and not flail my legs with too much enthusiasm. As for this video here, oh dear do I really sound like that? It's awful! Sorry to inflict my unbelievably awful accent and inane twitter on you but you can always turn the sound off.