Various Families
6 glazes / Spectrum
Six Spectrum glazes that sit together on our shelf without sharing a Spectrum line. Four of them are Spectrum's Stoneware Metallics, and two come out of the 1100 stoneware range.
Various is our grouping, not Spectrum's. Every page here names the range the glaze actually belongs to.
Cone 4/6Bisque to Cone 041 studio favorites
Search results
Results
Various Families by the numbers
6glazes on our shelves
6at Purple Level
1good on texture
1studio favorites
Every Various Families glaze we have in house
Hover any tile to see a pot fired in it, or tap once on a phone.
Jump straight to one
Nothing by that name.
6 to choose from
How the Various Families line works
Four metallics and two colors that had nowhere else to go. The metallics are the reason to look at this shelf: Mirror is genuinely reflective, and Pewter reads like tarnished metal.
Spectrum fire their samples at cone 5. Our glaze kilns run cone 5½.
Coats
Two to three coats on cone 04 bisque. Gold Rain is the exception worth naming: Spectrum warn it runs, so keep it well up off the foot and protect the shelf.
Layering
Spectrum recommend overlapping their glazes for new results. A metallic over a color is where this shelf gets interesting, and a metallic that runs is where it gets expensive.
Food and safety
Spectrum say most of their cone 4 to 6 stoneware glazes are lead free and dinnerware safe. Some of the reactive ones carry an ACMI cautionary label because of copper or vanadium in the wet glaze, which makes them unsuitable for young children or anyone pregnant to handle. Wet only. Fired and cooled, that is not the concern.
Clays that suit Various Families
Clay body, thickness and cone all move these, which is Spectrum's own guidance for the range.
From The Clay Hole University
More info about Various Families below, but first... Everything we teach about glazing, written down and taught properly. These are the glaze lessons, and they are a small corner of a library that runs from centering your first pot to selling your work.
GuideGlaze Brushing Techniques, Coat by Coat
GuideGlazing Big and Intricate Pottery Faster
GuideGetting the Most Out of the Mega Glaze Tool
GuideMaking, Logging and Dialing in Test Tiles
GuideGlaze Problems, Causes and Fixes
GuideGlazing on the Wheel for Even Coats and Clean Bands
GuideBubble Glaze with Dish Soap
GuideMixing Your Own Glazes: What It Actually Involves
GuideMaking a Glaze Catcher
GuideOxide and Carbonate Washes
GuideWhen to Use Celadon Glazes
GuideHow to Use Dipping Glazes
UnderglazeHow to Use Underglaze: Techniques, Rules and Firing
UnderglazeMishima: How to Inlay Slip and Underglaze into Carved Lines
UnderglazeWipe-Away Texture: Underglaze and Oxide Washes on Bisque
The Various Families test tile pot
Every glaze family on our shelves has its own test tile pot, and it is the fastest way to decide what to put on a piece. It is a fired pot wearing the whole family, one numbered tile per glaze, on a surface built to show you what that glaze actually does rather than just what color it is.
Look for Spectrum Various Families written on the rim. Each glaze on this page carries its tile number, and the numbers run around the pot.
One trick worth knowing
Some glazes tell you loudly that they run. Others hide it. Look at how the brushed lines fired: crisp edges mean a stable glaze, and edges that went soft and fluid mean it moved, and it will move on your pot too.
About these images and what your pot will actually look like
We have done our best to represent every glaze here accurately, and you should still expect your pot to look different from what is on this screen.
Our glaze tile images are digitally created. They are built to show the character of a glaze, not to be a color match.
A screen is not a printout, a printout is not a test tile, and a test tile is not a finished pot. Each step in that chain shifts what a glaze looks like, sometimes a lot.
On top of that, the pottery itself changes the result: the clay body, how thick the glaze went on, whether it was brushed, dipped or sprayed, what was layered under or over it, where the piece sat in the kiln, how hot that spot ran, how fast it cooled, what was fired next to it, and how much texture the surface had. Two pots glazed from the same jar on the same day can come out different.
Treat every image here as a starting point, and treat a test tile fired on your own clay as the real answer.