Electives · Finding the thing
Keep trying new things until you find the one that sings to you.
Most people walk in for the first time wanting one specific thing, and it is almost always the wheel. Then they spend three weeks fighting a lump of clay that will not center, decide they are not a pottery person, and leave. Meanwhile, across the room, somebody who has never touched a wheel is carving a slab box that will stop you in your tracks, and somebody else is on their fourth month of tiny animals. Pottery is not one thing. It is forty things that happen to use the same material, and the one that sings to you may be three tables over from the one you came in for.
This page covers why the wheel gets all the attention and why that is a problem, a map of the directions pottery goes sorted by what you already like doing, the three-tries rule for deciding anything, a thirty-day sampler, the signs that you have found it, and what to do if it turns out to be the wheel after all. Five videos.
This is the short version: the map by what you already like, the three-tries rule, and the sampler. The reasoning, the questions and four of the five videos are in the comprehensive version.
Read it, then watch it
Why this is written down and filmed, both.
A map of forty directions is a list, and a list reads well. What a list cannot do is show you a pinch pot becoming a bowl in nine minutes, or a slab becoming a sculpture, or a pattern being carved into a surface, in a way that makes your hands itch. That is what the videos are for: not to teach the technique, which each has its own lesson, but to let you feel in your hands which of the forty is calling. Watch a few and notice which one you cannot stop thinking about on the drive home.
So read the map first, so you know what exists. Then watch the sampler videos and pay attention to the itch. Then book the table, not the wheel, and try the thing three times.
Use both, in this order
The map by what you like, then the three-tries rule. Then the first video, which is pinch, coil and slab in nine minutes. Then a table on a class night, and whichever one itched.
The whole idea
The wheel is one of forty directions. Try the others three times each.
Most people come in for the wheel and half of them do not love it, and that is fine, because pottery goes in forty directions and the wheel is one. Pick directions from the map below by what you already like doing with your hands and your head. Try each one three times before you decide: the first try is confusion, the second is mechanics, and only the third is an opinion. When one of them makes you lose track of time and think about it in the car, that is the one, and it does not matter which one it turns out to be.
The poster child
Why the wheel gets all the attention, and why that is a problem.
The wheel is the most filmable thing in pottery. A lump becomes a bowl in ninety seconds, on camera, with wet hands and a spinning disc, and nothing else in the studio looks like that. So the wheel is what people see, the wheel is what they come in wanting, and the wheel is what they judge themselves against in week three when the lump still will not center. It is a wonderful tool and a terrible first impression, because it is one of the few things in the building that is harder than it looks.
The rest of the room is the opposite: easier than it looks and more varied than anyone expects. On a class night here, twenty to twenty-five percent of the people are at the wheels and seventy-five to eighty percent are at the tables, hand building, using slab molds, carving, glazing, sculpting and decorating. The wheel is not the studio. It is a corner of it, and people who never sit down at one make some of the best work on the shelves.
The map
Forty directions, sorted by what you already like doing.
The map, by what you already like.
Nobody can tell you which direction is yours. But what you already enjoy, at a desk, in a kitchen, with a pencil, is a very good guess about where to look first.
What you already enjoy is a good guess about where to look first.
If you like drawing
Underglaze painting, sgraffito, mishima, carved lines, wipe-away texture. The pot is a page. Start with the underglaze lesson and a slab tile.
If you like building things
Slab boxes, lidded boxes, teapots, butter dishes, lamp bases. Corners, joins and lids, with a ruler. Start with the lidded box lesson.
If you like chemistry
Glaze testing, mixing your own, crystalline glazes, mason stains. Test tiles, a log, and results that nobody else on the wall has. Start with the test tile lesson.
If you like fire
Raku, naked raku, horsehair, saggar, pit firing, obvara. The kiln as the artist. Start with the raku lesson and the next workshop.
If you like tiny things
Miniature pottery, ceramic jewelry, the mini wheel, sprig molds. An evening produces a shelf. Start with the miniature lesson.
If you like big things
Coil-built vessels, sculpture, planters, large serving bowls. Weeks-long projects that take up shelf space and pay it back. Start with the coil lesson.
If you like precision
Nerikomi, neriage, faceting, geometric carving, tiles that stay flat. Patterns that reward patience. Start with the nerikomi lesson.
If you like fast results
Slab molds. More than a hundred and fifty of them, a slab roller, and a finished form in twenty minutes with the texture and glaze all yours. Start with the slab mold lesson.
If you like characters
Figurines, sculpting, creatures on pots, Trees of Life. Start with the figurines lesson.
If you like function
Pitchers that pour, strainers, spoons, cruets, salt shakers, tagines. Objects with a job, tested in your own kitchen. Start with the pitchers lesson.
If you like texture
Forty ways to add it, stamps and maker’s marks you make yourself, imprinting, relief carving. Start with the forty textures lesson.
If you like the wheel but hate centering
Throwing off the hump, the mini wheel, tap centering, and slab molds for the forms you would have thrown. The wheel on your terms. Start with the off the hump lesson.
The rule
Try anything three times before you are allowed an opinion.
The three-tries rule.
The first time you try anything in clay is confusion: where the tools are, what the words mean, why it is not doing what the video did. Nothing you feel on the first try is information about the thing; it is information about being new. The second time is mechanics: your hands know where to go and you can pay attention to what the clay is doing. Only the third time are you actually doing the thing, and only then does the question of whether you like it mean anything. Three tries, on three separate visits, and then decide.
This is the rule that would have kept most of the people who left after three weeks on the wheel, and it is the rule that stops people writing off hand building because their first pinch pot was a lump. It applies to everything on the map, including the direction you are sure is not for you, which is often the one that sings.
- 1First try: confusionExpect nothing. Learn where things are. Make the lump.
- 2Second try: mechanicsHands know the moves. Watch the clay instead of your hands.
- 3Third try: an opinionNow you are doing the thing. Did you lose track of time? That is the only question.
The sampler
Thirty days, four directions, one evening each.
The thirty-day sampler.
A month of class nights with the wheel deliberately left out, so the rest of the room gets a fair hearing. Adjust the directions to the map above; the shape is what matters.
A month with the wheel left out on purpose. Swap the directions to suit the map.
| Week | Direction | The evening | The lesson |
|---|---|---|---|
| Week one | Pinch and underglaze | Three pinch pots, then underglaze on the best one with a fine brush. An evening that ends with something painted. | Pinch pots, then underglaze |
| Week two | Slab molds and texture | A slab through the roller, a slab mold from the wall, a texture pressed in, a rim finished. Twenty minutes to a form, the rest of the evening to make it yours. | Slab molds, then imprinting textures |
| Week three | Coils and carving | A coil vessel built to six inches and left under a sheet, then carving into last week’s leather hard slab piece. | Coil building, then carving and sgraffito |
| Week four | Something you were sure was not you | Miniatures, a figurine, nerikomi, a tile. Whichever card on the map you skipped over. Three tries starts tonight. | Whichever lesson the card points to |
| Then | The wheel again, or not | Sit down at the wheel with a month of hand-building in your fingers, and notice whether it sings now that it is a choice. Either answer is right. | How to throw, if the answer is yes |
The signs
How you know when one of them is singing.
It is not that you are good at it. It is these.
The other ending
If it turns out to be the wheel after all.
Sometimes it is. The person who left after three weeks and came back a year later for hand building sits down at a wheel one night with a year of clay in their fingers, and the lump centers, and it sings. That is a real ending and a common one. The month away did not cost them anything; it gave them hands that understood clay before they asked the clay to spin. The throwing lesson is exactly where it was, and the wheels are open to every Level.
And sometimes it is the wheel and something else, which is most working potters: they throw, and they carve what they threw, or they throw and hand build the lids, or they throw for a living and sculpt on Sundays. The map is not a menu you pick one thing from. It is a room you get to walk around in for years.
Watch it
Now watch five directions and notice which one itches.
Watch this one, then book a table.
None of these potters work here or know we exist. Between them they cover pinch, coil, slab, carving, sculpture and the habit of trying. The still frames load while you read; the player and its cookies wait until you press play.
Pinch, coil and slab in nine minutes. Watch for which one makes your hands want to move. The other four videos are in the comprehensive version.
How it works here
Ten thousand square feet of directions, and most of them are open on day one.
This page is written for potters everywhere. Here is where our studio stands.
Three things to know here
Wheels, slab rollers and more than a hundred and fifty slab molds are open to every Level from the first visit. The certifications for slab rollers, brush-on glaze, dipping glaze and raku are each a short evening and they unlock a direction. And on a class night, three quarters of the room is at the tables, so the person who never touches a wheel is in the majority.
Open on day one
Wheels, slab rollers and slab molds are open to every Level. The pinch pot, the coil pot, the slab box and the underglaze brush need no certification and no waiting. Most of the map is available the first night.
The certifications unlock directions
Slab rollers and slab molds, brush-on glaze, dipping glaze and raku each have a short course, a quiz and a signed agreement. Each one is an evening, and each one opens a whole card on the map.
The tables are the majority
Twenty to twenty-five percent of a class night is at the wheels. Seventy-five to eighty percent is at the community tables with slab molds, hand building, carving and glazing. The wheel is a corner of the room.
Raku is a workshop
Fire as a direction runs separately from membership, in scheduled workshops with a certification. If the itch is fire, that is where to go, and spots go fast.
Instructors know the map
Tell the onsite instructor what you liked doing before clay and they will point at a table. That conversation is the fastest route through this page.
Three tries, three visits
Shelf space and a bag of clay are the only cost of trying anything three times. Name and date on the bat, and the second try starts where the first left off.
Questions people actually ask
The ones that come up in week three.
I came for the wheel and I hate it. Am I a pottery person?
You are a person who does not love the wheel yet, which describes most of the room. Try three other directions three times each and see which one you think about in the car. If it turns out to be the wheel a year later, that is a common ending too.
How do I choose from forty directions?
By what you already like doing with your hands and your head. Drawing, building, chemistry, fire, tiny, big, precision, fast results, characters, function, texture. The map above sorts the directions by those.
How many times should I try something before giving up?
Three, on three separate visits. The first is confusion, the second is mechanics, the third is an opinion. Nothing you feel on the first try is about the thing.
Do I need a certification to try hand building?
No. Pinch, coil, slab building, underglaze and carving need nothing. Slab rollers, brush-on glaze, dipping glaze and raku each have a short certification that is an evening long.
What if nothing sings?
Then you have not tried the one that will yet, and it is usually the direction you were most sure was not for you. Week four of the sampler exists for exactly that reason.
Can I do the wheel and something else?
Most working potters do. They throw and carve, or throw and hand build lids, or throw all week and sculpt on Sundays. The map is a room, not a menu.
Related lessons
Six directions to start with.
Three to read next.
Every card on the map points at a lesson. These are the six most people start with.
That is the whole idea
Forty directions. Three tries each. One of them will sing.
The members who have been here longest almost never do the thing they came in for. They came for the wheel and found slab boxes, or came for mugs and found glaze chemistry, or came to make one gift and found themselves running a raku workshop. Not because the first thing was wrong, but because they kept trying things until one of them would not let go. That is the only method there is, and it works on everybody.
If you want why the wheel hogs the spotlight, the signs you have found it, the questions and the other four videos, switch to the comprehensive version at the top. Otherwise, pick the direction from the map that sounds least like you, and try it three times.
Written for potters everywhere. Where our studio does things differently, the page says so.
Which version would you like to print?
Both print clean, with the videos turned into labelled boxes you can search for later.