Gary Jackson: Fire When Ready Pottery
A Chicago potter’s somewhat slanted view of clay & play
Categories: bowls, classes, glaze, surface decoration

For the final class of my Intermediate Wheel class this session, we decided to do a trading-stealing-exchanging-White Elephant kind of game… with the category being large serving bowls. We had so many beautiful bowls in the mix… that all got mixed up, traded up & each went home to new homes!

Categories: bowls, glaze, patterns, surface decoration

Just one of my “not-so-basic” class demo bowls… after a banded layer of white slip, then carved through with leaf patterns. A quick layer of an amber celadon glaze tops it off. And I’m kinda diggin’ the sparkly gold flecks in the pooled areas.

Categories: glaze, mugs, stamped

Looks like Lisa is enjoying her perfectly purple mug while puzzling!

Categories: glaze, holiday, mugs, stamped

Green with envy… FRESH FROM THE KILN!

Here we have the full batch of handmade shamrock mugs in random shades of green! Gotta clean them up, take some photos & get ready for my SHAMROCK MUG SALE only on my pottery Facebook page… mark your calendars for this Friday at 7:00pm CST.

Click on www.facebook.com/firewhenreadypottery this Friday!

Categories: glaze, soda-fired, stamped, surface decoration, textures

This week has been crazy busy with teaching class & preparing for my Lillstreet 3-Day Soda-Firing Workshop this weekend… and getting some new stuff ready for “4×4 : FOUR MAKERS” for next weekend. So I’ve spent a bit of time adding some inlaid glaze to these highly textured pieces.

There is already some colored flashing slip accent in the stamped areas… but I wanted the impressions to be highlighted too. So I’ve added some tenmoku glaze into them & gently wiped it off the top surface to reveal some more contrast that I’m hoping the soda kiln will love!!!

Categories: glaze, mugs, process, production, soda-fired, surface decoration, textures

So I’ve been glazing the latest batch of “hybrid mugs” in preparation for this weekends Soda-Firing Workshop. A simple liner glaze of tenmoku… and then I had to decide which ones to leave raw outside, and which ones need a bit more lovin’ & a bit more colored glaze accents before soda-firing.

Categories: glaze, platters, stamped, surface decoration, textures

The large purple platter has been so popular at my art fairs this summer… and I typically only had one per show! Well, this time… I HAVE TWO AUBERGINE PLATTERS for this weekend’s Mud & Metal Holiday Home Show!!! Yes, two… count them TWO!!!

Categories: color, glaze, platters, stamped, textures

More glamour shots of that same purple platter from last night’s kiln unloading. We’ve been joking about what “color” this actually is. Do we think it might be too pretty to just call it purple?… but if we call it something fancy like “aubergine”… then I think I should be able to charge twice as much for it!!! HA!!!

Categories: glaze, kiln firing, platters, stamped, textures

A pretty little purple platter fresh out of last night’s kiln… before & after. It’s amazing what a little kiln magic can do to some powdered glaze chemicals!!!

Categories: glaze, holiday, kiln firing, process, production

Glazed, loaded & ready to go! Just need to shut the lid, cross my fingers & turn the kiln on! A big batch of glazed Christmas Trees coming soon for this weekend’s Second Holiday Home Show!!!