Day Four of the Tony Clennell Workshop

By the third and final day of the weekend workshop with Tony Clennell, we all realized that we had no hope of getting all 8 of our pieces completed.  So we were invited to drop in one day during the week.  I went in on Wednesday, my usual pottery day.  But funny enough, since I was planning to catch up on other things, I started out in a dark mood, not really wanting to be there.

Fortunately, I had my friend Mariana there, to keep me company, and to cheer me up.  So by the end of the day, it was a good day, and I was glad I had come.

Surprisingly, my highlight was putting handles on my 4 mugs.  Here are a few photos :

This one looked somehow incomplete, so I added a button of clay, and borrowed one of Mariana's flower stamps.  I really like the effect.

So I kept going with the stamps.  This one, one of my handmade stamps from a long time ago, but a perfect match to the swirl inside.

This one is also a stamp from my handmade collection.

And this one, too.  One of my handmade stamps.

By the end of finishing those 4 mugs, I felt a sort of euphoria, and realized that I was so happy with the results, that I will need to make more mugs in my near future.  I had told myself, after making way too many mugs and other items with handles in my second ever pottery course (I think it was entitled "Get a Handle on It"), that I would never make another teapot or mug.  But it has been long enough.  At least for the mugs.

I forgot to take a photo of my casserole dish, but I added handles to the sides, trimmed and added a handle to the lid.  It turned out pretty good.

The mountain bowl, I ended up cutting the foot a bit shorter, and then it looked perfect, and I didn't want to ruin it by adding handles.  It has a really nice feel to it, when you put your hands under to lift it up.  I managed to repair the center, which I cut through when I tried to remove it from the bat.

The big vase with rough slip on it, I was planning to add 2 big handles to it, but in the end, ran low on time, and decided that the smooth handles against the rough textured vase would probably not suit my aesthetic, so I decided to leave it as is.

My footed basket to which I attached the top and side handles last week, the top (thrown) handle was fine, but the ribbon side handles popped off while drying.  So that's the way I decided it will stay.  So it seemed like I worked all day, and only got handles on my mugs and that one casserole dish.  But I feel satisfied with the outcome, and feel like it is done.

But that didn't mean it would be my only adventure in clay.  I had more of that Columbia Buff clay, which I didn't particular like the groggy feel of, when throwing, but it seems a great clay for sculptural work.  So I threw much of the remainder of it, and took it home to decorate :

If it was larger, with more cut-outs between the leaves, this would make a funky candle holder.  But I decided it will just be a table decoration.

In a future one, I want to layer the leaves over each other, to give it a multi-dimensional look.  Stay tuned, and you'll see what I mean.

With the clay I cut out from the piece, I ended up making a handmade spoon.  Fun.  I've never made a spoon before.