PPP-Penguins and Potfest

Well, I made seats, a table, long dishes and other such delights, but what really caught the imagination at Potfest was penguins. Lots of them! I even had to send an SOS to Zoe to bring down some penguin reinforcements, ( so as not to disappoint a fair few children - “Have you got any more penguins please?’)

Much to every one's amusement the reinforcements arrived in wetsuits. Well wrapped Inigo, thanks!


The reason for the rush on penguins was my competition piece. The theme this year was a ‘Shrine’. Mine was a ‘Shrine to Flight’. (Another reason that I wanted to hold on to the eagle for a bit). I'm afraid I never even got a good photo of it, though I hear that plenty of other people did.



It appears that it caused a fair bit of positive interest, winning plenty of votes. It won not only the ‘Spanish prize’, (the Spanish potter being Emile Biarnes whose work was stunning), but also the potters prize and the public prize! I was more than a little embarrassed, not being one who is comfortable with too much attention, but Niek Hoogland said, “Just enjoy!” So I did.


Potfest in the Park gets better each year with even more interesting overseas exhibitors. It was great to meet up with bloggers Dan, Margaret and Hannah, and find another blogger Novie Trump from North Virginia, who had made her impressive pieces in this country with someone else’s clay in 3 weeks flat.



So a successful show for me all round and a lovely show to do. I was pleased with my stand and Rodger's extra white boxes just did the trick. It was strange doing it without him, but probably good for me to HAVE to do all the talking for once. A reward indeed after the ridiculous amount of candles burning at both end that have been going on.

Back home I have been unpacking in go slow mode. No more big outside commitments for a while which is good as I need to slow down now for a bit, especially when I see those bags under my eyes in that bloggers photo!

Table, comets and a glimpse of Royalty

It was a long wet Sunday, so I was quite happy to stay in the cosy workshop (with two kilns cooling), working on some penguins and some tiles. By tea time I had gradually prised the door of the rather too hot big kiln open, and by supper time I had managed to unpack it and have look at my table. It must work as a table, because I lost the lens cap of the camera shortly after taking this photo - because I had put it down on the ...TABLE!

I'm pleased with the top surface, the glaze is really smooth and tempting, like one big tile. It is still a strange beast, more of a character than a beauty, but I have a certain fondness for its eccentricity.




There has been a lot of glazing this week, and still a lot left to do, but it is great to see some new work out tonight.


It seems ages ago that I started these long dishes. They are difficult to fit in the kiln, so kept missing out. Long dishes need long things on them, hence comets and thin mermaids.


I've just packed the big kiln up again with my pelican seat. It is the only thing in it. I'm not convinced that it is totally dry yet but as the bricks are still pretty hot it's been stewing all evening. I'll see what the steam test looks like before I go to bed, and depending on that may bisc fire it tonight.

I was enjoying drawing on these dishes at the beginning of the week. They're drying out now and hopefully may be ready to bisc as Pelican comes out. It is back to back at the moment to get things finished for Potfest in the Park. Rodger is busy making me some extra display boxes at the moment, doing a little each day - he's on to the sanding stage now and it was a treat to have his company in the workshop this morning. The finger joints are a work of art in themselves, he was enjoying using my scroll saw for them. Pity to paint them over.

As an interlude from pots this week I did have Wednesday afternoon off to go to Kirkcudbright and play samba for the Queen - at least that is what I was told. But of course it was playing samba for the crowds WAITING for the Queen, NOT for her at all.

Anyway we saw the lady, small and bent in her lovely turquoise outfit with matching pill box hat, (surrounded by some even bigger and shinier hats of local dignitaries ). She arrived in a huge maroon limousine, did a quick tour of the harbour - I was told that the brave lady was given champagne and pate to sample, followed by a freshly grilled scallop from the local fishing boat. Then off she flew in her helicopter, at which point the heavens opened with a loud clap of thunder, and everyone dived for cover.
So just a glimpse of royalty but lots of strange cameos which might well appear on a pot one day.

Dogs in the Park

Here are some images from 'Potfest in the Park'. I completely forgot to take any so they were all taken by Rodger who thankfully was a bit more with it than I was! The dog seat was the Potfest 'competition' piece, the theme was 'Cultural Connections -Building bridges'. I went through several ideas for a suitable title ranging from 'Bridging the Yap, to 'Canine Connections', but so many people asked, 'Surely you can't SIT on that, will it be STRONG enough'?- that I ended up simply calling it 'SIT!' Rodger caught a shot of someone, namely John Stroomer, doing just that.



The design for the top was based on the building bridges theme, certainly the dogs in question would disrupt the proceedings if they failed to obey the 'sit' command....My 'huge' piece looked so much smaller when it was out in the open. I made the mistake of constructing it at table height, and it wasn't really until it was biscuit fired and I put it on the ground, that I realised that the dogs were much more hidden and slightly 'squashed' by the top than I had anticipated. Next time I will be careful to keep looking at the piece as it will eventually be seen. It is all part of the endless learning.

What a lot of work packing pots is though. Three seats came with us to Potfest and we had to use the caravan as a trailer for both them and the display boards.'Someone' discovered that seats wrapped in blankets and sleeping bags made a pretty cosy nest for cat napping. We were loaded and ready to go, had said goodbye to Allie, when Rodger suddenly remembered something he wanted to check somethng in the caravan. Lucky he did, otherwise we would have had quite a shock to find Timbalada helping us out at Potfest!



It was a really enjoyable show, and it was great to meet so many nice potters and see such a variety of excellent work. It was lovely to meet Margaret Brampton with her very beautiful and delicately painted slipware, it is so interesting when you feel you know someone's work through their blog to see it for real!

Chris Lewis brought some of his wonderful stoneware garden seats of a scale I could only dream of! Quite an inspiration though he does have a walk in kiln which he said he fires only twice a year. I don't think that I could handle that!

Unbelievably I did sell all those mountain bike mugs, so all that frantic work over the last three weeks paid off. I sold two of the bigger pieces, which was great, and got some very nice feedback which makes it all worthwhile. Certainly enough to give me confidence to keep going with them.

It has taken the rest of the week to unpack, put the showroom to rights and generally catch up on all the other stuff that has been piling up. I would love to say that I was able to take a few days off, but I have the Army Windsurfing Prizes order deadline looming. Better press on with that!