Wendy House Spray Booth extension

It was Wednesday before I was ready to get some slips onto my finished boat sections. But they were too big to fit in the (dish washer casing) spray booth and I would need to take them outside. The weather teased me, every time I thought I had a slot the blue sky disappeared and a ridiculously heavy shower chased me inside again. But Mr Fixit Rodger came to the rescue.

It can be hard living with a 'never throw anything out' person, but I regularly have to eat my hat, because he appeared with an old Wendy house frame with which he made up a spray booth extension. It not only worked perfectly but with the high ceilings it can be hoisted up and down on pulleys.

Actually, a copy of Jim Robison and Ian Marsh's book on slab built ceramics had arrived that morning. Rodger was looking through it over coffee and spotted a photograph of Jim spraying in a sort of plastic sheet extension which gave him the idea. Good timing indeed. Thanks Jim and Ian.


Yet more equipment from Glasgow School of Art. We collected this beast of a slab roller on Tuesday. What a monster.

Quite excited about the huge studio rearrangement which is going to happen sometime late summer, and the potential of this new bit of kit.

Row, Row Row the Boat

I'm getting there. Spending way too long on this piece, totally absorbed, but a couple more days should do it. Well, for the time being anyway.

An idea takes shape

There has been a lull in creativity since Spring Fling. That isn't to say that I have been sitting about twiddling my thumbs. It is more that I haven't been feeling that inspired or enthusiastic about what I have been making. The two teacher's plates are being glazed fired tonight, but I had a such a tight deadline in which to make them they had become more of a worry than a joy.

Then the tile panel which I thought I had in the bag turned out hopelessly the wrong size...don't ask! Ok then, do, but it's boring.
Anyway, they rattled about within the perfectly fitting border, so I have been re-making them. Aaargh!

I was becoming allergic to my lovely workshop and by last week I thought I would go mad if I trailed one more oystercatcher.


Something had to be done!

So I started the project which had been swimming around somewhere at the back of my head for sometime. I knew that once underway I would get hopelessly carried away, so I had been putting it off until I felt that I had cleared enough of my other deadlines first.

But at last, I got the new die cut out and have made a start.

The first attempt split as it firmed up and I could see that there was a stress line being formed even as it was coming through the die. We mushed up several attempts and an extra centre ridge has sorted out the problem.





The straight length worked fine but I wanted to curve the end. So we made a ski run out of thin ply on which to 'birth' the shape.



The hull is coming together now.


and the prow...



and a bed of ripply sea,


and a boat full of sailors. Arms on tomorrow.

It seems fitting that here I am boat building as outside the rain has been pouring down. On Saturday evening I dashed into Dumfries to take part in the Guid Nychburris (Good neighbours) parade with the Samba Sisters. Miraculously just before the floats set off the rain stopped, and the town came out to enjoyed the procession umbrella free.

A dead clam in a box

Well, that's Spring Fling 2011 Open Studios over for this year. Phew! The windows have never been so clean, and the workshop so free of spiders since....this time last year!


It is a wonderful event, and thank you to all the hard working Spring Fling committee who put in so much time and effort. Over the three days I pretty much had a continual stream of visitors coming through. Indeed there were moments when so many arrived at once I really rather wanted to hide.

I met some of the most delightful people, but used to a quiet space mainly on my own and wanting to do everyone's interest justice I find it quite exhausting.

Thank you to all the kind and appreciative people who made the trip here. Please come back again when I have recovered!

Tomorrow the spiders can return and the workshop will soon go back to it's ordered muddle.

My nephew Patrick, was around four years old when he was taken to Australia where he had to meet hoards of Australian relatives. After being the centre of attention for the day, he told his Mother that he wished he was a clam, no, he wished he was a 'dead clam', indeed, he wished he was a 'dead clam in a box'. I remembered his words this evening.

I'll crawl out again tomorrow.

An exciting new piece of equipment

I have acquired another pugmill, 3/4 hp with a larger diameter nozzle. It seems that this Autumn I might be making even bigger extrusions. My little 1/2 hp pugmill struggles away, and although it's heart hasn't exactly slipped a beat, I know (when it overheats), that I am pushing it possibly beyond it's capacity.

It is a sad story really. Indeed a crime. The last ceramic course in Scotland finishes this term and the department is closing down. It has a good reputation, great facilities and tutors. But it is not 'cost effective' and takes up too much room. Apparently you could fit so many more students into those spaces that kilns, wheels, plaster rooms, and indeed pugmills take up. I am so lucky to have benefited from an outstanding education, I had a choice of colleges, and the one I went to, Corsham, had a ceramics department to die for. Over the last two decades they have been closing down one by one, and especially with the demise of Harrow, and the message that sent out, I do wonder that soon there may only be one or two in the whole of the UK.

I felt like a vulture picking over the sorry remains, I can only say that I will feel bound to put it to good use. But it will all have to wait for a bit as we will need a major workshop re-organisation.


Meanwhile, 'Spring Fling' looms closer. Only a week now until the regions major open studio event. I spent a day this week clearing out the shed, with visitors coming round the back and through the workshop we have to make make it look rather more respectable. Next week I'll spruce up the workshop, well that is in between glazing a last kiln load of pots, tackling the damp cupboard full of platters to slip decorate, and throwing a couple of large plates for two teachers who are retiring in 4 weeks time. Better get my skates on then.

I made it for Colvend school's teacher Miss Macdonald 21 years ago. The boy with the chalk in the centre was my son, and most of the children were recognisable. There were only 14 children (from 4 to 11 years old), in the school. A group of school teachers came in on Saturday with this plate in their hands. They wanted the same idea for their own teachers. This one was when I was still using a majolica glaze, which I have gradually phased out and now don't use at all. For one the glaze recipe ceased to work consistently well, (a change of materials perhaps), but I was also finding that I was getting too tight with my painting. The last straw was when at a show someone asked if the designs were printed. However it was good to see this plate and remember where I was at 21 years ago.

Crime and Punishment

I packed up the pots for the show at Imagine Gallery yesterday. It took most of the day making each one into a football of bubblewrap.I couldn't bear the idea of a great hefty foot kicking the teeth out of one of my mariners, or of some great hulk sitting on one of the long flat hanging dishes - both of which I am quite sure happens in transit. So I had in mind the Princess and the Pea.

Before I said goodbye to these pieces I had a bit of fun trying out 'movie' on my hand held camera. Please excuse the amateur wobbles.

I Shot the albatross

All averred

Stony Eyes

Dead Birds and Deadlines

I don’t know where the last three weeks went. I have done a fair bit of throwing, and the stock shelves are filling up though I could still do with more time on the wheel making the popular lines such as mugs and jugs. But my mind has been more occupied with the ‘Ancient Mariner'.



I have put in a fair amount of time into this project, at times perhaps rather indulgent, but I was really enjoying myself.



Last Saturday the deadline loomed loud and clear and I had to pull out of a planned hill walk with friends to knuckle down and finish off the glazing. The kiln HAD to be packed that evening. As I listened to some torrential downpours hammering on the roof I decided that maybe glazing in a cosy workshop with some good music was the better option anyway.




I was a bit nervous about opening the kiln this week, sometimes I have a quick peek last thing at night when it is nearly, but not QUITE cool enough. But no, I waited, not wanting to have bad dreams. One of Hannah’s pottery films from her excellent ‘Pottery Porn’ film night last week was about Gwyn Hanssen Pigott. At one point this wonderful elderly lady announces, (with a smile), that - ‘Actually, making pots is quite stressful...GLAZING them is stressful, PACKING the kiln is stressful.....FIRING them is stressful.... and OPENING the kiln is stressful’. Oh how we love making pots really, but I did think of her words on Wednesday.



And thankfully I am pretty pleased this time. I seem to have sorted out the somewhat drab finish of the mark one of the ‘Coleridge candle boats’. Rubbing slips into the faces has lifted them and brought out the expressions just the way I had hoped.


I had a customer today (who bought my snakes and ladders low stool for a ruby wedding present. Happily entwined snakes: ups and downs of married life, all deliciously symbolic.) She was a painter, and most enthusiastic about her work. ‘I am worried that I don’t have enough time left in my life to paint all I want to’, she said. I knew what she meant, I often have that feeling myself.

A Motley Crew

Last month I made some 'Coleridge' candle holders. Though reasonably happy with a couple of them the finish on the others was pretty disappointing. I was really getting into the theme, so I have been enjoying making some mark two versions.


Using an extruded section as the boat form, the ends are filled with sailors, all based on the narrative of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.








I have taken some time to make several test heads. They have all been coloured in different ways and I will test fire them before embarking on colouring the real ones. I really need their expressions to show this time, as the first ones were way too dark. I have used about three different layers of thin slip, dabbed on and then rubbed in with a dry brush, with some oxides later.


Here is the Motley Crew drying in the sun. I had to give them all names so as to identify which is coloured with what. The phone book threw up a few good ones.

Post script is that they came out of the test kiln tonight and I have some beauties. (Charlie Beaver, Ramsey Stitt, Horace Kidd......). Tomorrow I'll get the bigger pieces coloured, yippee.

John Dix Demo

It’s been a couple of weeks since I went to a John Dix Demo day and I’ve been meaning to post a few photographs. Jan, who had been here the previous week on a work placement, was travelling down there from my place, and it gave me a much needed prompt. So I travelled over the border down to the Solway Ceramics Centre with my friends Su and Hannah - only 12 miles across the Solway as the crow flies, though around 60 or 70 by road.


I have to admit, I come out with hands up - I have never really GOT tea bowls. I have noticed that they are often approached with some sort of hallowed and reverent air, which has has never been a good starting point for me. However I watched and listened to John Dix making his, with increasing fascination. There was much I recognised in the fluidity and economy if his movements. The harmonious calm of hands which knew where they were going and what they were after. I loved the way the wheel turned with a lazy serenity, and the deliberate but controlled irregularity of the form as it developed its own character. I know I when I got home and looked at my own pots they suddenly seemed horribly tight.



But most of all I loved watching him make these long dishes. Thrown without a base, uncurled and thudded onto the table to stretch it some more, then the end pushed over with a confident hand. It could have been a Tai Chi movement.

These fat handled jugs were made to pour with either a right or left hand, a lovely idea.


It was glorious Spring weather last weekend, just perfect for a planned hill walk in the Moffat hills with some friends.

The first real sun for me this year. I felt great that evening and slept so well. I see that I just need to climb a hill every day.

Little Squidgey Amorphous Things

It is really annoying when you have to change your email address, or for that matter your mobile phone number. Even when you THINK you have informed everyone in your address book, there is always someone who has been missed. And then does everyone ever delete the offending address/number? I know I am guilty of having a few duplicate email addresses leading to the oft asked question.... 'Now is this his OLD one, or his NEW one'?

Well for one of the above reasons I have been missing my 'Potfest in the Park' emails, so I had no idea of what this years competition theme might be. However, some dear folk, called 'Us,' took it upon themelves to enlighten me today with this kind post card. Thank you 'Us'!