I love it when patterns, textures, slips & glazes all come together!
Just a few more “teaser textures” that jut came out of my soda kiln yesterday!!!

Well, tonight I unbricked & unloaded my soda kiln.
It’s always exciting to take the brick door off and finally see my newest pieces!

It’s like a little treasure hunt. You have certain expectations & hopes while you’re
making the pieces and glazing them. But at some point, you have to release control
and let the kiln do its own magic. So here’s a quick glimpse at the front of the kiln…
knowing that the front “face” is always the grayest from a lot of soda. And then the
pieces that are deeper into the kiln have a bit more color.  As I unloaded, I was quite
pleased with the colors… a little brighter & more vibrant than usual?!

It’s always a good feeling to unbrick the kiln and find you cones melted exactly
to where they should be for a cone 20 firing. Towards the end of my firing,
it was impossible to see the top cone pack at all. It was quite “hazy” in the kiln
with flames shooting out at me when I tried to peek in. No visibility!!!
Glad I turned off the kiln when I did!

Well, I just added the last batch of soda mixture into my kiln.
Very hot. Lots of flames – so much fun! Not for the weak of heart.
The soda mixture is introduced on a long angle iron through a brick over the fire box.
The filled angle iron goes in and gets dumped into the fire box.
Instant combustion. Instant vapors. Instant flames shooting out all over the place!
Luckily, tonight I only burned off a few arm hairs.

Once the angle iron is removed, the “peep” brick gets put back in to keep the soda vapors
“trapped” and moving around inside – hitting all the pots inside building up a beautiful surface!

In case you’re wondering, my soda mixture is a combination of soda ash, soda bicarbonate,
whiting and wood chips. Mixed with a little bit of water to create a lumpy, oatmealy texture.

So now it’s just a waiting game for the kiln to get back up to top temperature
and for a little extra “soak” to get some more soda effects on the pots inside!
And now for the tough part… the kiln cools all day tomorrow, and won’t be unloaded
until Monday night! Gotta wait… stay tuned for pictures!

After three days of glazing & wadding, I finally loaded my kiln tonight.
And it might be my tightest packed kiln yet?! So now it’s time for a couple hours
of sleep, a quick shower and then it’s pack to the studio to get the firing started!

But first… a few photos…
Here’s my studio cart filled to the brim with glazed & wadded pots.
Thanks again to my Dad for making me a wonderful cart that works so well.

And here’s the Lillstreet soda kiln empty… just waiting to be filled up!

After about an hour of loading, the back stack was finished. I have a lot of work, and wanted
to get the most bang for my buck, so I packed the kiln pretty darn tight. Barely any kiln shelf
is showing as every surface has a pot or a tile covering it! I’m pretty pleased with myself…
notice how close to the arch my tall textured slab vases fit right in there!!! Sweet…

Part way through the front stack, I realized I didn’t have quite enough large pieces glazed.
So I went back up to my studio to glaze a couple more oval casseroles and a few serving
bowls. Then it was back down to finish off the loading!

I always find the front stack (of two shelves deep) to be a little tougher than the back stack.
I think it’s because the back stack is smaller and earlier on… so you still have a lot of sizes
to choose from and feel like you have a LOT of room to fill still. When you get to the front
stack, reality starts to set in and you start to realize you might not be able to squeeze
everything in?! Along the way, you start to get creative. I decided to split the two-shelves
into two separate stacks. And when I got to very end, I ran out of tall pieces, so I “floated”
a kiln shelf instead of leaving any dead air space at the top.

So, close to five hours later, my kiln was loaded… at long last.

After driving back into the City from Midway Airport, I had to swing past
the studio to unload my latest bisque kiln. And everything looked good.
Not a single “explosion” from my “still-too-damp-to-fire-but-going-in-anyway”
textured slab vases! I knew that they had to fire while I was away in Delaware
if there was to be any chance of getting them into Friday’s kiln loading!

Back to back kilns… So tonight I unloaded my last bisque kiln, and immediately
re-loaded it with another batch of greenware. This may not be my finest packed
kiln ever, but it was more about getting all of my textured slab vases into the kiln!

Kiln Layer #1 – A collection of mugs, bowls, ovals and some more “kiln filler”
that didn’t quite make it into my last kiln!

Kiln Layer #2 – A large porcelain platter by my studio neighbor Karen Patinkin.
Without this layer, I would have had an extra 3-inches at the top. And you know how
I hate to leave extra space in my kilns! So I slipped in Karen’s platter to fill the space!

Kiln Layer #3 – With a collection of textured slab vases… with the newest, not-quite-dry-yet
ones upside down so the moisture doesn’t get trapped. Somehow it make me feel better
knowing that damp bottoms have space to breath! Plus, a few glazed terra cotta planters
from my cousin’s visit from Minnesota with his kids! They’ll be excited to finally get their
projects back so they can start growing their gardens!

Kiln Layer #4 – A couple more textured slab vases – but these were too tall to fit in.
So I laid them down sideways! Plus, a couple more terra cotta planters!

It’s all loaded tonight… but I felt it might be a good idea to let it sit overnight to give
some of the pieces a chance to dry a bit more. So I’ll turn it on tomorrow with a little
pre-heat time and fire it slowly.
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With just one week until I need to have everything glazed, wadded and ready to be
loaded into my next soda kiln, I figured I better get started with firing some of my pieces.
So I loaded my kiln tonight. When this bisque kiln cools and can be unloaded, these pieces
come out and I turn right around and load it again with more! There’s going to be some
marathon glazing days next week if I have any hope of being ready in time!

Layer One : Ovals, Mugs, Small Vases and more!

Layer Two : Bowls, Soap Dispensers, and some new two-parters ala Julia Galloway!

Layer Three : Slab Vases, Ovals & Tumblers… some stacked two high to fill space!
Scott… I’m trying to get closer to tumble stacked with no shelves… soon… ha!

Layer Three and a Half : more Ovals, Soap Dispensers, Small Vases and Tiles.

Layer Four : As the back half was filled with Layer Three, I was stacking just the
front half… and my studio neighbor Corinne Peterson had some mural tile pieces
that she needed re-fired for a kids classroom project.

Layer Five :another layer of Corinne’s pieces to be re-fired.
I love the sharp color contrast to my very neutral gray greenware pieces!

After unloading Karen’s glaze kiln, I turned around and help Corinne load her kiln.
Luckily, she had a third of a kiln left open… and you know how I like to be the “filler.”
She called my yesterday to ask if I had anything left to fire. I said I had some bisqued
ovals that didn’t make it into Karen’s kiln. So glazed last night, and loaded them into
the kiln today while it was still warm from Karen’s firing! And I just LOVE the crazy
juxtaposition of Corinnes’s textural monoliths & my somewhat “precise” stamped ovals!

Enough of the photo session… gotta get back to the loading. All the way up to the top!
More pots. More ovals. More ikebana. More kiln space to be filled!!! Thanks Corinne!

Check out more of Corinne Peterson‘s finished works by clicking on her name!

Today I unloaded the glaze kiln I shared with Karen Patinkin.
As you may remember, in that kiln were some new glazes I recently made.
I was encouraged by the test tiles that I fired, and couldn’t wait to actually put them
to the test on actual pieces! And of course, I can’t start small with just a couple mugs.
Instead, I glazed a LOT of pieces in this kiln with the new glazes. Luckily… they seemed to
work very well so I gave them names and labeled the buckets! Here’s a very quick preview.

SPRUCE – a beautiful dark evergeen shade that breaks well on my stamped textures.

GOLDEN CRANBERRY – a thicker glaze that breaks golden, but pools with a burgundy tone.

CILANTRO – kind of a yellowy, parsley color… didn’t break as light as the test tile did?!

And the best part?… they look even better on B-Clay!!! And they feel great too!!!
I love how the Spruce Green turns a beautiful shade of blue and yet breaks so beautifully.
The Golden Cranberry shows more depth and pools well in the grooves.
Cilantro is yellower, with a nice clear color that accentuates, but doesn’t fill the stamps.

Guess I gotta start making more things out of B-Clay, huh?!