A buyer's guide to handmade pottery take2

Handmade pottery it's a little more than a mere recipient for food or drink ,a beautiful vessel properly made will enhance your dining experience ,will become a familiar sight in your kitchen and hopefully bring you comfort and joy.
Taking a little time to pair a pot to a dish you love, hugging a warm mug you know like the back of your hand in the morning, provides a moment of pause and beauty in which you can concentrate on your food , aromas and textures, and be thankful for people you are sharing it with .

There are many kinds of pottery and you can find beautiful examples for each in the ceramics and pottery category which might be overwhelming at times.
Hopefully by the end of this article you will be able to identify each style and have an easier time choosing the kind that best fits your personality and household.
I will concentrate on traditional pottery that follows the entire process from a wet lump of clay to a finished piece of pottery with the help of extremely high temperatures.
Other types of ceramics you might encounter are industrial ready made decorated pieces.Depending on the method of decoration those pieces could be fully functional and safe to use with food (if they are glazed and fired in a ceramic kiln) or mostly decorative if they are decorated with enamel ,glass and ceramic paints and cured in a household oven.It's always a good idea to ask the question: was the work fired in a kiln or baked in the oven? If a piece is cured in the household oven the designs should not be on the surfaces that come in contact with food and I would inquire about potential safety warnings that come with each brand of paint.
The difference between glaze and paint is that glaze is fired at such a high temperature that it becomes a thin layer of glass permanently melted onto your pot while paints are just on the surface and they will come off in time.

Back to pottery , if you are the kind of person who likes travel, ancient cultures, ethnic foods and exotic looks you might be interested in buying the oldest form of pottery:

EARTHENWARE

Like it's name earthenware is made of clay in warm earthy colors ( red, orange ,buff or soft white) with a porous appearance after fired.
Terracotta is one common type of earthenware it literally means baked earth and you are familiar with it in the shape of red clay flower pots.
What makes earthenware such a great choice for a flower pot, ( allows excess water and air to penetrate the walls keeping your plants healthy) poses a problem when you want to use it with your own food.
That's why the way functional earthenware pieces are glazed is very important.
The glaze will seal the surface of the pot making it watertight and practical to use with food and drinks. Ideally you want earthenware pots to have the body fully glazed with just a small ring on the bottom which will reduce the moisture that might penetrate your pot walls.
The reason you don't want moisture is that it could make the body expand and in the process crack the layer of glaze. This might not be noticeable at first but a repeated cycle will result in crazing of the glaze which you can notice as a thin web of lines and crazing could facilitate the release of glaze components in your food or it could harbor bacteria.
Another reason you don't want moisture in your pot walls is because they might get too hot to handle after microwaving them.
Ways to minimize these potential problems are drying your earthenware fully between uses , serve but don't store foods for long periods in your pots ,wash them promptly with hot water and detergent and avoid using abrasives. Exercise caution when using the microwave and stop using it if your pots start getting hot or have any chips or cracks.
Earthenware history is thousands of years old and it's widespread used in many countries around the world. The relative low firing temperature compared to stoneware and high fired clays like porcelain , make it perfect for casual and relaxed pots with a playful and colorful surface.

STONEWARE

is clay fired to a higher temperature than earthenware ,with the consistency and durability of stone. This makes it perfect for dinnerware, storing containers like pickle jars or ovenware like casseroles and pizza stones.
Left alone and fired to the maturing temperature of the clay stoneware should be watertight, however the way you will most probably encounter it , is glazed in a wide array of colors for added durability and aesthetics.
Stoneware items are the work horse of the kitchen ,it is preferable for the glazes to be strong and durable, able to withstand frequent washing , food acids and heavy use without major damage to the glaze .
Good questions to ask your potter are : is this item microwave or oven safe, are the glazes used food safe ?
Because stoneware doesn't absorb water when properly fired ,moisture problems related to crazing discussed in the earthenware chapter are not as relevant but it's still recommended to avoid crazed ,textured surfaces in the places that come in contact with food.
Regarding food safety from a chemical leeching point of view you will need to get reassurance from the potter you are buying the ware from.
Lead and cadmium are materials regulated by FDA and glazes with lead and cadmium should be tested for glaze stability.
On a bright note the use of lead in glazes is being phased out by functional potters who have safer alternatives these days. There are countries that don't have restrictions on the use of lead and you should be aware when you buy ethnic pottery that it could have been imported at first as strictly decorative and after changing hands a few time it might inadvertently ended up in the dinnerware aisle.
Stoneware is a good choice for busy households and available in colors covering the whole spectrum. The items made of stoneware perform well under heavy usage and the best way to take care of them is to avoid hitting or dropping them.If your pots develop a dull sound when tapped on the rim it means they might have a hairline crack and you should discontinue usage.

HIGH FIRED CLAYS

I'll start with high fire porcelain because everyone is familiar with it ,from pretty tea time china to sinks and bathtubs porcelain's use is widespread and extremely popular. What makes it so popular? First of all durability. Despite it's dainty appearance your grandmother's heirloom tea set stands witness that porcelain can survive unscathed, a serious amount of time.
Usually fired at the highest temperatures for functional ceramics porcelain clay becomes vitreous with a composition similar to glass which makes it food safe . Extremely strong after being fired , porcelain items can be very thin , light and one of the most sought after qualities of porcelain was translucency ( the capability of letting the light pass trough the walls of the piece provided that the walls were thin enough).
Porcelain handles high temperatures well and the pure white color makes a great canvas for unlimited decoration techniques.
Gold , silver ,platinum and cooper accents are sometimes used to enhance porcelain , that makes the items not microwave safe because the colors called lusters have a high concentration of metal in them .
Tea and coffee stains can be easily removed with baking soda and with proper care your porcelain will live to be handed down to your grand kids.
In today's market there are many kinds of porcelain available to work with and many porcelain bodies have been formulated to fire at stoneware temperature thus making the use of porcelain widespread in potters studios and more affordable for the buyer.

There are many other clay bodies that fire at high temperatures and the common thread is that they are very durable and they share a more restricted color palette.Depending on the type of firing oxidation or reduction the pots will be on the colder color scheme in oxidation(green,deep browns ,blues etc)or warm in reduction (orange,warm browns,reds)
High fired clays are fully vitrified at maturing temperatures which makes them generally safe to use in microwaves, ovens and they will not absorb moisture reducing the chance for bacteria to cling and propagate on their surface, which brings me to the next chapter;

WOOD FIRED POTTERY

this is the moment when I tell you to throw the rule book out the window.Did I say crazing is bad to have in earthenware? Well now I say crazing rules in wood fired pots and you should look at it as a plus.Crazing, textures ,exposed clay bodies carbon trappings that look like black spots , all these and more are things you will encounter in wood fired pottery and they are embraced and loved by all who appreciate organic, natural shapes, simplicity and refinement .
Considered the purest interaction between fire and clay in ceramics, wood ash fired pieces are often left unglazed and in a unique unrepeatable process ,the ash deposits from the burned wood will form a layer of glaze on the pots.
When glazes are used most of them draw on Japanese pottery roots and have names like, shino (white to peach thick glaze often with a crackle pattern),tenmoku (iron rich glaze resembling oil spot with colors that range from persimmon to yellow crystals to deep dark black) ,oribe (dark green copper based glaze that can be translucent or matte depending on thickness)or celadon (very light gray to blue/green ,iron based glaze, usually translucent)
The glazes mentioned above are generally food safe but you should not store foods in crazed pots and for drinking vessels if needed you could start by buying the ones that have a liner glaze extending all the way to the lip.

SODA FIRED POTTERY
is the softer looking cousin of wood fire with a similar organic appearance and interesting surface textures .It could be extremely colorful or in a soft range of grays.While I'm trying to be objective here I have to say that soda and wood are my favorite types of pottery because of their uniqueness and individuality of each piece ,so it's hard for me to find cons about buying them. They might need a little more care in washing than a straight up solidly glazed stoneware item but generally speaking they are durable and solid.

RAKU
pottery employs the help of fancy pyrotechnics , red hot pieces are taken out of the kiln and quickly cooled in a smoky medium, straw, paper.The results are usually rich metallic colors and dark looking clay bodies.Raku pots are not food safe because of high concentration of unstable metals in the glazes and the porosity of the body.They will not hold water and they need to be treated gently.
Horsehair raku is a southwestern variation on raku which uses strands of horsehair or feathers on white burnished pots ,the burning hair leaves very dramatic dancing black lines on the surface and is sometimes traditionally accented by a turquiose stone.Strictly decorative.
Western Raku was adapted from a traditional Japanese type of firing.Without getting into too many details a Japanese raku tea cup is intended for use in the tea ceremony and you might encounter pieces like that.They are usually high priced and treated as collectables here's a link where you can read more about it.

Stalked

My work is in this blog which made me remember that this side project I've started didn't go anywhere yet.Maybe I should have made the pieces more affordable and a lot of them.
I was interested in the people who buy them ,are they quirky and curious ,do they have a sense of humor .I'll add more to the series .When I had the timeline set I didn't take in consideration the time that takes for the work to be discovered by the right person.I'll extend my deadline to another year,I didn't get any feedback on it yet anyway and start by having a new limited edition of 50 small creatures by the end of February 2010.I already have 10 made but I love them and we're still friends,can't let them go.

Progress on my illustrations

Unfortunately like most other people I have to prepare for holidays so what I looked forward as my downtime is becoming a busy complicated period.I had to cut back on the time for painting and go out to buy presents and food.
In the process I unknowingly ditched two of my friends I really wanted to see for lunch (wave,sorry) because yet again I misplaced my cell. Somebody should make a cell tether ,something similar to those pacifier clips.
Anyway two of my drawings are ready ,summer and fall, they are totally cheesy but my 5 year old was jumping around happy about them so I guess I did it.
I'm sorry I didn't make all 4 I promised but I'll get them done in January.They smell amazingly nice because I used a pure beeswax layer on top and buffed them to a soft shine.It was fun.


I have a favorite part in the fall drawing and you're the only ones that will know it : the white rabbit gets it.Not a word to the kids.

day planner part two.

It's night ,I'm tired ,no tree yet, playdate check,packages on their way to the post office,and first painting started check.
Did I mention I'm trying to make 4 paintings by Friday for my kid's school? I decided that nothing sells summer better than a kid with a bowl of strawberries.
It just so happened that despite my best intention,the androgynous kid I had in mind turned out to be my own. yes.I ended up with a portrait of my daughter no matter how hard I tried to make that kid look like somebody else I might like.
there it is , I think I just took a step back in my project because it would be kind of silly to donate her portrait to her school .I'm getting back to this tomorrow.

Day planner

I woke up at 5am to make it to fitness boot camp ,while wildly flailing my hands around I started laughing hysterically because I remembered the last time my muscles were so so sore and I certainly was not paying money for it.
In fact I hated it ,I got pulled in a Romanian gymnastics program when I was little and it was an amazingly painful and breaking experience.That might be the reason I never stepped in a gym in 20 years and considered hiking caving and outdoors climbing the only kind of things worth having sore muscles for until I quit that too.
anyway.
I decided to make an artwork donation to my child's school.So far I payed 4 times more in materials than the recommended donation, and the work must be done by Friday.
I promise to have a picture of it soon it will be hopefully something kids 3 and 4 years old can relate too.They better be liking it.yeah!
I have to buy and decorate our tree today, prepare for a play date and do more research on the pottery buyer's guide I publicly promised to a bunch of people on Etsy.So far I had a coffee,sharpened a pencil and hoped breakfast will magically appear in front of me.
It didn't .Somethings are just wrong.

Hola

Wow I didn't write in my blog since summer.
A few things have happened but nothing extremely interesting.
There a very strange kind of quiet in Detroit and I took the habit of counting for sale/lease signs on my daily commute.I had the fleeting thought of opening a street studio by my house, moving to Denver, moving back to Europe but I shook it off and got back to my daily routine.
Between September and December I made approximately 400 new pots working in my "spare time" whatever that might be and sold most of them.
The show at the end of the year the Potter's market was a great success that managed to sell 25 ooo pieces of pottery in 3 days for a a little over 400 000 $ .
Along with 130 other potters I worked until tired,ate and laughed in the little kitchen that was the heart of our behind the scenes activities.
A great sense of community and a beautiful way to kick start the holiday season.
I don't usually get teared eyed at Christmas but this is the first time I didn't see my extended family in 3 years and is starting to hurt a little.

I'm getting ready to take a break from functional work and put together a show .


I might be optimistic but I hope it will take me 3 months to come up with something I like.So far the idea of abandoned buildings ,grafitti , urban decay and what home means after the human component is gone is appealing to me.
I'll start by taking pictures I will later print on fragmented wall pieces.

I'll be better about keeping up with the blog.
I think.
I'm trying to put together a basic buyer's guide to pottery and I'll use the blog for all the rough work.It should be interesting

Condensed

I'll try to fit my last couple of months in one short post.
One day at the park I felt a sudden surge of energy, pushed a kid aside and quickly did the monkey bars.High on my achievement I climbed a tall tree (like a panther) I said in my defective little brain.That was almost 4 weeks ago and yesterday was the first time I was able to use my right hand without significant pain.My right eye is twitching which drives me crazy and I had an hysterical nurse call to threaten me with an imminent heart attack .get in line lady.I put the phone down and carefully picked up my breakfast
I was looking for Margie Lawson.My neighbor came back from a garage sale with a little box filled with neat old pottery tools.When my hand stopped hurting, yesterday, I've took a closer look , wanting to use them and there was a name inscribed on them, Margie .She had to be working in a common studio if she marked her tools, she or her kin lived close and she must be old because the tools are old timer.Maybe I've even meet her before.Anyway the tools were 50 cents and I don't know any potter who loved their tools and would let them go for 50 cents so I decided to look in obituaries for her name.There was one Margie Lawson who died at 72 years old ,a Margie who was a wasp during the war,a doctor,a teacher but no info about Margie the potter.

I hope she's in Florida.
I also hope the tools carry good energy.