While setting up for this weekend’s SECOND HOLIDAY HOME SHOW, I’ve got some new things to put out!! Not only do I have two kilns currently firing & cooling… but I’m restocking the shelves so there’s plenty of holiday gift ideas for everyone!!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN… with one of the largest displays of The Ghouls Collection! So much fun to see them all lined up in front of a custom tile surround that I made for my sister & family!

Looks like Kristin Conneely has been busy working her “mosaic magic” in her studio… still working on some collaboration pieces for ART IN THE GARDEN. It’s always so cool to see how different artists re-imagine things you’ve made for years… giving them a breath of fresh air!!! Can’t wait to see the finished pieces… September 9th & 10th in Glenview!

For more info… www.grassrootsartfair.com

I posted pictures of these tiles a couple days ago… but from the backside as I was stitching them together with copper wire. The pictures got a good amount of lovin’ as the backsides have some great soda flashing marks! But I’m hoping that people like the front side as much or more! I love how the textured tiles came together kinda like a cathedral window quilt. This one-of-a-kind wall piece will also be at “4×4 : FOUR MAKERS”… and there’s just one… so it might go fast?!

Enough of the teasers… here’s a quick look of the big collaboration project we’ve all been working on! The “4×4 : FOUR MAKERS” have been busy “making”… four tiles each for the four seasons! So sixteen tiles total in one large installation… but first we need to get it up on the wall?! The show opens at 2:00pm today, so we gotta get going quick!

Spring, Summer, Winter, Fall.

And here are the same tiles after soda-firing… framed & ready to be hung on the gallery wall. A fun collaboration challenge for each of us… making thematic tiles using our usual medium & techniques. So some are metal, some are glass, and mine are clay! We’ll have sixteen tiles in the collaboration wall installation. We’re pretty excited to see how it’s coming together… and we hope you can come see it in person this weekend in Evanston!

Okay, so a couple weeks back I made four tiles… as part of the “4×4 : FOUR MAKERS” collaboration project based on the four seasons.

Truth be told… these were made for the soda kiln… shown here glazed & stained ready to go into the kiln. But with the randomness & occasional “tragic” results of a soda firing, I knew that I had to have a back-up plan… or two. So this was Plan A : soda fired. But to hedge my bets, I also made Plan B : glazed. And just in case… Plan C : plain tiles with some separate parts & pieces I could stack & add-on to the base tiles. Luckily, Plan A seems to have worked out fine. So I’m going with the Plan A ones for the show!!!

Getting ready for this weekend’s “4×4” gallery show… so today there’s a good bit of glue & epoxy drying all around!!! Currently working on this large ClayQuilt with over 200 textured & soda-fired tiles!

For those of you who have never been to my condo…
a quick glimpse inside while celebrating NATIONAL TILE DAY with a few shots of a tiled wall I made several years ago! All handmade, textured & soda-fired tiles filling the wall from floor to ceiling… from bedroom to bathroom.

The final “surprise” challenge for my LILLSTREET THROWDOWN class was to interpret five different words onto five different tiles. They each received the same words & a blank tile, and then had fifteen minutes to “represent” the word on each tile. The words were PAISLEY, NOSTALGIA, CHAOS, FESTIVE and JUXTAPOSITION. Always fun for me as the observer to watch each of them approach a challenge in different ways – both in interpreting the word and their handbuilding approach & techniques!

CHAOS –

NOSTALGIA –

FESTIVE –

JUXTAPOSITION –

PAISLEY –