Here come the strawberries! Last year I had enough to make 5lbs of jam, it looks like another bumper crop this year, if I can only keep the slugs away! Mixing the colour. I love the clay at this stage, it is so very tactile. I carefully paint in lines of slip which […]
I am loving this Allium Bulgaricum (Summer Bells) at the moment. After it’s beautifully elegant conical papery buds have punctuated the foliage for a good five weeks,these subtly coloured bells emerge like one at a time like the limbs of a butterfly coming out of a chrysalis. The bees love them and once each […]
I am so often astounded by nature. This tiny seedling is growing on the side of my work, where it has been wrapped in plastic for a couple of days in a warm humid environment. I feel terrible taking it off! I have been making the slip for the surface of the piece today. […]
Today I am feeling for all the people who have worked so hard to make the RHS Show at Chatsworth House such a success this year. It is only ten minutes from my garden, so I guess the weather is as wet there as it is here. The one consolation is that the colours in […]
I have been so very saddened by recent events, and so today I got everything ready so that I could sit quietly in the workshop and observe the minutes silence and think about all the people who are hurting at the moment. When the clock was still chiming, a swallow flew in through the open […]
This piece is called Doo Wah Diddy ( from the song) and I love the way Helen Sinclair captures human emotion so precisely in all of her work. This girl is strutting without a care in the world and she has the presence of a carefree empowered person. “She really blows my mind”
People often ask if I have many firing disasters and I usually say no ( with crossed fingers) because I can usually tell when a piece is not strong enough to hold its shape when I am building it. I put a couple of layers on this this morning, and then it started to sag. […]
These woven pheasants by Juliette Hamilton look simply lovely strutting beneath the leaf laden beech tree. Before I framed them in long grass. It was lovely to sit outside this morning and have my first cup of tea with this view.
Having completed the base this piece is now ready to be turned back over. This was a much heavier turn due to its shape. Maisy dog was her usual helpful self! I applied the slip which looks a but of a dull grey at the moment, but when fired it should go the colour […]
This beautiful weather is drying the clay really well so I needed to turn this piece today. I must do this when the clay is at exactly the right consistency. Too wet and it will collapse, too dry and the slip will not adhere to the surface. Psyching myself up, this one is 130 kg. […]