HANDBUILDING - ALL LEVELS
The five-session course runs daily for two hours from Monday to Friday. All the courses are suitable for all levels, including beginners and returning students looking to improve their skills.
If this is your first time working with clay, this is a brilliant way to be introduced to clay as a material. You will begin your session by handling soft clay and rolling out coils to later use to make a pot of your choice. On subsequent sessions, your instructor will demonstrate how to use the slab roller compress clay to long sheets that can be cut and shaped to create larger scale work.
For those who are more experienced, you are very welcome and we will explore the techniques you find most suited to your aims. We will then help you improve your skills and aim for those forms you wish to pursue.
The course allows you to keep 6 pots per student depending on size, if you do wish to keep further pots, you can pay £10 per extra vessel directly on the website under the ‘extra pot payment’ tab. This fee is to cover the clay, firings and glazing. We do however encourage students to be as critical of their work as possible and only keep what they know they will use, or is going to sit proudly somewhere to look at, as we want to aim to be as environmentally friendly as possible and clay can only be recycled pre their firings, but not after!
We are now offering the option of returning to the studio 1 week (minimum) after your workshop to glaze your own pieces in a selection of our 10 house glazes. These sessions will take place under the guidance of one of our experienced instructors. You can book your glaze add on session here.
There is a maximum of 10 people who attend each class.
THROWN AND ALTERED - INTERMEDIATE
Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th June - 10:00-16:00 both days
We are incredibly pleased to invite Sabine Nemet as a guest potter for the first time to teach a two-day workshop at Crown Works Pottery.
Sabine completed an apprenticeship as a thrower in East Germany in 1997 with Hans Joachim Grünert in Waldenburg(Sachsen). She then underwent a three year long thorough training in producing domestic ware exclusively on the potter’s wheel. This is also where she was first introduced to wood firing. Since then, the excitement of staying up all night feeding an ever hungry kiln with wood, the direct impact of when and how much wood to put in the firebox, has never left her. In 2000 Sabine travelled to England to gain more experience in ceramics and has lived in the UK ever since.
Sabines pots are mainly thrown, sometimes altered, cut and put together again. As decoration she use stamps, made from carved porcelain. The shapes on the stamps are based on nature, seeds leaf pattern, flowers, which are then pressed into the clay repeatedly. When the clay is completely dry, the imprint is filled with different coloured glazes and then sometimes glazed over again. She use simple glazes on the inside of pots and on the outside various coloured slips or no slips at all to fully utilise the effects of wood firing and soda glazing.
In this course you will explore throwing a range of different shapes to then alter. Sabine will guide you through the techniques to do this with shapes such as casserole dishes, bowls and platters. You will look at the importance of different handles and how they effect the final pieces and how to apply lugs.
Two Day Courses - Throwing on the wheel - ALL LEVELS
All classes will run from 11:00-17:00 on both days
Suitable for complete beginners as well as those who are more advanced; An All Level Course.
For our beginners we will take you through the basic techniques of throwing on the wheel. We will start with learning how to centre your clay, moving straight on to throwing cylinders and bowls, then learning how to turn your work on the Sunday to give your bowls feet and to tidy your pieces up. On the last half of your second day, we experiment with decoration techniques with slip as well as mark making with texture tools and stamps. We will then fire your work for you, putting a tin white glaze over your finished pieces, after they have been through their initial firing, giving a lovely muted affect to any coloured slips you have used beneath this glaze.
If you are already more experienced, we will help you progress from the level you are at , taking into account your current aims to increase your skills further.
We are now offering the option of returning to the studio 1 week (minimum) after your workshop to glaze your own pieces in a selection of our 10 house glazes. These sessions will take place under the guidance of one of our experienced instructors. You can book your glaze add on session here.