Special occasions require special pottery…
looks like a very festive dinner planned to celebrate the end of the year!
Thanks for sharing Gerry & Rosene… and here’s to a better New Year!!!

A little late for Santa…
but it looks like someone is planning on milk & cookies for ONE!!!
And I sure hope there’s more cookies where those came from!!!
Thanks for sharing Karen!

Another one of my super-secret Christmas projects was a commissioned piece for college football coach P.J. Fleck. My brother-in-law Scott is a long-time fan of P.J. Fleck, as well as my pottery, and thought the perfect one-of-a-kind gift for P.J. would be a custom platter with his personal mantra on it.

ROW THE BOAT.

So I set off on making a large stamped platter. I threw the platter and left the center section smooth… which kinda killed me! You know how much I LOVE a good spiral!!! But with plans to put the logo in the center, I knew I would need a smooth “canvas” to work with.

My brother-in-law Scott is also a commercial printer with access to a vinyl cutter. So he offered to cut a few vinyl stencils for me to work with. Now keep in mind… this is the very first time I’m even trying this technique! I’ve seen others do it… so it’s gotta work, right?!

I started by peeling off the backing and then pressing it smoothly into the center of the platter. I wanted to make sure the edges were attached everywhere… but I was kind of afraid of pressing too hard! I didn’t want to make it hard to peel off later… or even worse, leave any kind of adhesive residue on the platter that might affect the glazing later..

After peeling off the top layer, I filled it all in with some thick underglaze. Kinda piling it on top with a pretty thick layer of color.

When the underglaze was mostly dry… but not totally, I peeled off the vinyl stencil. I was afraid that if it got too dry, it might flake off more while peeling it off. I knew that I wanted to keep it as clean as possible… as I didn’t want to do any clean-up & touch-ups later.

The toughest part was peeling away all of the smaller parts & pieces…
I kept finding more areas that were oddly “glossy” and knew that there was still some vinyl under the underglaze that wasn’t drying!

A little touch-up here & there… but not much at all.

Knowing that I didn’t want to blur the image, I thought my best option would be to spray the glaze over the applied logo design. So I started slowly around the edge. And then gradually sprayed more & more to build up the glaze slowly over time. I don’t do a lot of spraying glazes, so I’m always kind of questioning when I’ve got enough glaze material on the piece. You don’t want too little… but then again too much is bad too!

And then it went into the kiln… with all of my fingers crossed.
Remember, this was my first time doing the vinyl stencil technique… first time using this new brand of underglaze… and unsure of how my glaze I “sprayed” onto the piece… and if the logo would blur out & “melt” during the firing?!!! A lot at risk here…

But… two days later… I opened the kiln to find this!!!
WHOO-HOO!!!

But the real photo that counts is the one where University of Minnesota Head Football Coach P.J. Fleck is showing off his new platter!

ROW THE BOAT.
That smile says it all.

Okay… PART TWO of the story!

With only two flat & two warped soda-fired plates,
I knew that these wouldn’t work for this special order of FOUR.
Especially since I had already decided that these dinner plates
were going to be my friends’ Christmas present!!!

So I quickly threw another set of plates.
Center. Compress. Throw. Spiral. Stamp.

This time knowing that a simple glazed firing would be a lot “safer” for warping this time around. Especially with the Christmas deadline closing in!!! This time I also hedged my bets by making five plates… so I would have a back-up if something went wrong!

I went with a “neutral” glaze combo… one of my cone six glazes. A honey-amber tenmoku looking glaze… I then sprayed a tiny bit of blue glaze around the perimeter to help with the contrast of the stamped impressions.

I was quite pleased when they came out of the glaze firing. The glazes melted and “broke” just right in all the right places. Not only were the stamps highlighted nicely… but that spiral?!!! Beautiful.

And now that Christmas has passed… and gifts have been shared… I can let the “secret” out. I decided to give Gerry & Rosene BOTH sets of plates! Starting with the soda-fired set “as requested” in the special order. They LOVED them!!!… and didn’t seem to care so much about the warping. They know all about the process and the inherent risks!

And then they opened the second package…
with the “replacement” set of glazed plates…
and they LOVED those too!!!

So much so… it brought tears to Rosene’s eyes!
What more could you want from your Christmas gifts!

Mission accomplished.

And now… finally...
Christmas “secrets projects” can be revealed!!!

So I got a request for a “special order” to make a set of four soda-fired dinner plates. They were to be for some very good friends of mine… actually, my VERY FIRST art fair friends ever!!! They wanted four dinner plates that were very “neutral” so that any of their other more colorful pottery pieces would still work along with them. When I took the order, I made sure to mention that I don’t make a lot of soda-fired plates as there’s a larger propensity for them to warp during the firing. I also explained the inherent randomness of soda-firing… which they are fully aware of as they have quite a collection of my work!

So I made their dinner plates… taking extra caution to compress them really well, make sure they’re not over-worked, and very careful not to pick them up in a way that might warp them. They had asked for four “matching” plates that each had a different stamp pattern. They looked great after the bisque firing, so I glazed them for my latest soda-firing. I even made sure to us a LOT of wadding under the plate… probably double what one would normally use!

Here they are glazed… with a tenmoku inlay into the stamped impressions. A thin spray of tenmoku in the center area which should turn an “neutral” amber color… and a very light spray of a green glaze for a bit of a subtle random accent.

And then it was time to soda-fire them. So I placed them towards the back of the kiln. Making sure that they were placed on NEW flat kiln shelves! I was confident that these plates were going to work out… as they’re a commission order for very special friends!!!

When I unloaded the kiln, I was very excited about the “neutral-ness” of the plates! They’re going to LOVE them… as Rosene’s favorite color is BEIGE!!! Which I keep advising her that BEIGE is indeed NOT a color!!!

And here they are… the four “matching” dinner plates each with a different stamp pattern! With very subtle accents… and yet very “neutral.”

Again, the GOAL was a set of dinner plates… very neutral…
each with a different stamped texture!

After they came out of the kiln, as I was stacking & packing up the pieces… only then did I notice that TWO of plates were perfectly flat… while the other two were not!!! Two of the plates were warped terribly!!!

Ugh…. WARPED!!!

As these were a SET OF FOUR… two warped and two flat were not going to work for me!! I was going to need to make some replacements VERY QUICKLY… so they would be ready for Christmas!!!

Bright & shiny new… and SHINY BLUE!!!
A cobalt blue stamped platter fresh outta the kiln!

If anyone in the Chicagoland area still needs a beautiful blue holiday gift, let me know. I’m sure we can figure out a time for you to swing by to pick it up!!!

Shoot me an email for more information – first come, first served!
gary@firewhenreadypottery.com

Looks like there are some new yummies coming out of the oven! More Christmas cookies on a pretty stamped yellow plate. And if the cookies didn’t look yummy enough… SURPRISE!!!… there’s apparently a peppermint patty candy hidden inside! Thanks for the “sweet” photo Jody!

Never too soon to break into some Christmas Cookies, right?!
While decorating for Christmas it’s always good to have some sweet snacks to get you in the mood… again… and again!!! Doesn’t hurt when they’re displayed on a nice holiday green platter either! Thanks for baking & sharing Rosene!

This summer I reunited with a couple of my best friends from High School! They surprised me by showing up at ART IN THE GARDEN in August… completely unexpected! I haven’t seen them for YEARS!!! It was such a sweet surprise to see Anna & Jenn and their families right there in my art fair booth… SURPRISE!!! Especially their adorable Mom who has know me since our High School days!

So it’s extra special to see Mom’s display of my pottery pieces on her table (along with a Cory McCrory plate!)… but it’s the baby photos of Anna & Jenn that kill me!!! Could that BE any cuter… let’s just say they’re both several decades older now… but still just as cute!!!

‘Tis the season for red & green… as we head into Day Two of my limited-access & socially-distant HOLIDAY HOME SHOW! Wear your mask and buy some pottery for everyone on your holiday shopping list… and maybe a thing or two for yourself as well?! You deserve it… it’s been a rough year!