Our second demo this week with my SURFACE DECORATION class, was done by “My Talented Friend” Kristen Holub of Kayho Ceramics. She did an AMAZING sgraffito-carving demo on one of my platters. Remember the one where I shaved-off the bad colored slip, and then added a new layer of ombre’ blended colored slip? Well here it is again!

Kristen started with my colored platter – but then turned it onto a work of art showing off her own carving style. Going step-by-step teaching my students how to go every step of the way. I brought down my collection of DiamondCore Tools for her to use… along with my students who eventually had their chance to play along. It was an amazing night… so much fun & such a great demo!!!

And we can’t forget how great the Decorating Disks are from MKM Pottery Tools for dividing your pots into perfectly spaced segments for “evenly spaced” carved designs!

Kristen started out as a metalsmith when we first become friends many years ago. Then she took time off to become a Mom, and is now embracing her creative side in CLAY!!! She started as pottery student of mine, but quickly developed her skills & her personal style. She has now branched off and has her own studio space & brand-identity online. Be sure to follow her on Instagram – @kayhoceramics.

My how I love having talented friends!!!

Just a few plates with bands of color… ready for some sgraffito fun!!!

After yesterday’s trial’s & tribulations, I had a little “escape” when I got to do a little stamping with my SURFACE DECORATION class last night.

Of course I had to ride my bike to get there!!!

On a quieter note… I did also pull out my latest batch of reclaimed clay. Piled it up in a large plaster bat so it could dry out a bit to stiffen up into better clay. A bunch of wedging… coming soon to a studio near you!!!

Some folks think pottery just happens… make it, fire it, done. But there’s a more behind the scenes that most people don’t know about. Like the “joy” of physically scraping down all of the kiln shelves after every soda-firing to remove any glaze drips or soda build-up. Gotta keep the shelves clean & ready for the next firing.

My studio cart was filled with glazed & wadded pots… ready for a soda-firing!
We all made it safely downstairs in the rickety freight elevator.
Thanks to some masking tape “seat belts” to keep pots from bouncing off
the shelves during the journey downstairs!

Early morning bisque kiln unloaded… and now it looks like “someone” has a lot of glazing & wadding to do in the next couple days! My hope is to finish it all in time to load the soda kiln this Friday night! Fingers crossed…

Everything dried overnight as planned.
All of these pieces will need to be glazed & wadded later this week!

Also… kinda excited to get my “monster” from last session’s THROWDOWN class into the kiln. He’ll be a lot less fragile once he’s bisqued! And then I’ll just need to figure out how to add some color to him?!

Adding some color with flashing slips that will react in the soda kiln when these get fired next weekend! Wouldn’t know it now… but these “should” turn orange! Fingers crossed…