About three weeks ago, I went up for the St. Croix River Valley Pottery Tour.
It’s the biggest & best pottery tour of the entire year. So many great potters all assembled in one place. With a magnificent number of amazing pots to admire, caress, fondle and potentially purchase!!! Large white tents all over filled with pottery!!! What’s not to like?! Seven different studio locations hosting over fifty talented ceramic artists. Again this year, I did the tour with my friend & favorite metalsmith Sarah C. Chapman. She’s a pottery-lover too… so we tackled the Tour with reckless abandon!!!

So the question out there was….

Which three plates did I come home with?
I showed you fourteen different plate options and the challenge was to pick which three came home with me. Okay, so I said three… I guess I “forgot” to tell you it was TWO of each!!! My bad… oops!

And here are the Winners…

Beautifully slip-patterned & glazed plates by Ryan Greenheck.

And then we found these amazing plates during the stop at Will Swanson’s studio.
They are not only beautiful & stunning… but also incredibly crafted by the twosome of Ikuzi Teraki & Jeanne Bisson. The weight of the plates is amazing, the geometry, the simplicity, the texture, the feel, the color, the everything!!!

And I couldn’t stop at one set… because these ones were calling my name as well. Another amazing set of porcelain plates by Ikuzi Teraki & Jeanne Bisson.

So there are the winners in my little Plate Challenge.
Greenheck…     Teraki-Bisson…    and Teraki-Bisson.

Sure I should have stopped there. No need to get greedy… but c’mon…
With so much incredible pottery all over the place, how could I be expected to stop?!
So I also “had” to have these beauties as well…

Another set of bowl-plates by Bob Briscoe. I already have three sets of these and I use them almost every single day. I love them… I have three different colors & patterns, so what’s one more?

Plus, I “needed” to add another piece to my already-too-large” collection of Matt Metz pieces. He’s been working with a slightly new style with some new colors… including this buttery yellow.

I also got a set of tumblers by Shoko Teruyama… destined to be a beautiful new addition to my Mug Collection. Sure, they’re not mugs, but c’mon… they’re beautiful.

And who could resist a one-eyed panda?! Not me apparently!

The little add-on, unexpected purchase was this mask by Jenny Mendes. I was kind of hoping to get a mug for the “collection”… but Jenny doesn’t make mugs apparently?! Plus this rabbit-eared face was so much cooler, and so typically Jenny.

Another annual stop during the Minnesota Pottery Tour is a visit with The Rogue Potters. A fun group of wood-firing potters who aren’t really part of the “official” tour… but with a little grassroots marketing & signage, they’ve created a fun “addition” to the Tour. While there, I picked up this mug by Randal Anderson.

So there’s the recap. Another wonderful Pottery Tour up in the St. Croix area of Minnesota. So many potters. So many pots. So much fun. And so inspiring & rejuvenating… I need to make some more pots!!!