Pottery Classes Near Millcreek, Utah
The Clay Hole is a community pottery studio in Draper, twenty minutes south of Millcreek. A room of wheels, hand building tables, slab molds and a glaze wall, on one monthly membership.
Millcreek is where this valley learned that clay comes in more than one color depending how deep you dig. Membership is the only way in here, and there are no drop-in classes.
The drive from Millcreek
South. Either straight down 1300 East until it runs out of patience, or over to the freeway and down.
- West or south to I-215, then south to I-15. Or 1300 East south the whole way.
- I-15 south to Exit 289, Bangerter Highway.
- West on Bangerter to the 200 W exit, then right on 13490 S to Pony Express Rd.
- Past IKEA and Living Spaces. We are on the left.
About fourteen miles, roughly twenty minutes. Millcreek is long and thin, so the east end adds a few minutes and the west end takes a few off.
Nothing that lands close enough to walk from. Plan on driving.
When you get here
Parking is free and shared with a few other businesses. Anything not marked reserved is yours, and unlike the canyon there is no fee booth on the way out.
The brothers who dug here got different colored brick by digging deeper
Edward Potter Hemsley and his brother Job ran a brickyard in Mill Creek that they called, with no ceremony at all, The Brickyard. The marker on Brickyard Road records their method in their own terms. For deep red bricks they would plow two rows of deeply laid yellow clay and one row of black top soil. White brick came from the clay near the top of the pit.
Same pit. Different depth. Different color out of the kiln. That is the whole of ceramic chemistry stated by a man in the 1870s who just wanted the wall to be the right shade.
Brigham Young rescinded Hemsley's mission call so that he would carry on making brick. The bricks were judged more useful than the missionary.
Where the pit went
Salt Lake Pressed Brick bought the land in 1891 and it eventually became Interstate Brick, which ran until November 1972. The site is Brickyard Plaza now. It sits in the middle of Millcreek but was annexed by Salt Lake City in 1979, so it is Salt Lake City land with Millcreek all the way around it. The 1902 kiln chimney is still standing on it.
A big room, and everything in it is included
The studio runs to nearly 10,000 square feet. Membership covers the room, the equipment, the classes and the glaze. You buy clay by the bag and you pay for firing by the size of the piece. Nothing else is metered.
- Four instructors working the room in every instructed class, so nobody sits stuck for twenty minutes.
- 150+ underglazes alongside the glaze wall, plus dipping buckets on the higher levels.
- Bisque firing is free. Glaze firing is 5 cents a cubic inch, $4.80 minimum.
- Clay starts at $28 a 25 pound bag, and the discount grows with your level.
- Your own shelf to leave work on, which is the thing home potters never have.
A city still building itself a downtown, twenty minutes from a finished room
Millcreek has only been a city since the end of 2016. Before that it was the most populous unincorporated area in the county. It is now building itself a center from nothing, with a loop that is ice in winter and roller skating in summer, a climbing wall and a public market.
That is genuinely good and it is also two years from finished. In the meantime the local answer to an evening is the canyon, and the canyon has rules: dogs off leash on odd days only, five dollars on the way out, and the top gated from November to July.
Twenty minutes south there is a room that has been finished for a while, has no gate and does not care which day of the month it is.
- Four instructed classes a month at the lowest level, eight at the highest.
- Open studio Friday evening and both weekend mornings, on top of the classes.
- Your own shelf, which is the one thing a shared studio gives you and a canyon cannot.
- Seven days a week, odd dates and even.
Four levels, one monthly price
Every level gets the same studio, the same equipment and the same glaze wall. What changes is how many instructed classes are included, how much shelf you get, and how much comes off a bag of clay.
| Level | Monthly | Classes included |
|---|---|---|
| Green Level | $145 a month | 4 classes a month |
| Yellow Level | $170 a month | 5 classes a month |
| Purple Level | $200 a month | 6 classes a month |
| Black Level | $275 a month | 8 classes a month |
Open studio time is on top of the included classes, at every level. Clay discounts run from nothing on Green Level up to $6 off each bag on Black Level.
The part we would rather you read now than find out later
There are no drop-in classes and no single sessions. Membership renews on the 25th of each month and canceling has to happen before the 24th. Fired work has to be collected within two weeks of the kiln being unloaded. And the cheapest level shows you a real fraction of what a busy month here looks like.
If that list makes membership the wrong shape for you, it is better to know in the first minute than in the fourth week.
When the studio is open
| When | Hours | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Monday daytime | 10:30 AM to 2 PM | Instructed class |
| Monday to Thursday evenings | 6:30 PM to 10 PM | Instructed class |
| Friday evening | 6:30 PM to 10 PM | Open studio |
| Saturday and Sunday mornings | 10 AM to 1:30 PM | Open studio |
Doors open 15 minutes before a session starts, and the studio closes for fourteen holidays a year. The full list, with this year's dates, is on the class schedule page.
Other pottery near Millcreek
Millcreek sits between several options and none of them are in it. Here is the honest field.
- Paint your own
Color Me Mine Salt Lake
2725 E Parleys Way, the closest of any of these to Millcreek. Finished pieces you decorate and they fire for you. Much the easiest option and not the same thing at all.
- Make your own
Salt Lake Pottery Studio
965 E 900 S, north into the city. Wheel and hand building, kids, one time experiences, multi week courses and memberships. The broadest offering in Salt Lake and genuinely closer to you than we are.
- Make your own
Cottonwood Clay Studio
7587 S State St in Midvale, south. Weekday taught classes with open studio limited to people enrolled in a current class.
Salt Lake Pottery Studio is closer to Millcreek than we are and it is a good studio. What we have that they do not is scale: a room of wheels rather than a few, and a glaze wall you could spend a year on.
What people from Millcreek ask
How far is The Clay Hole from Millcreek?
About fourteen miles, roughly twenty minutes. Millcreek runs a long way east to west, so from Canyon Rim it is a little more and from the west end a little less.
Is the old brickyard chimney still there?
Yes. The 1902 kiln chimney from the Salt Lake Pressed Brick works still stands at Brickyard Plaza on Brickyard Road. Worth knowing that the plaza itself is Salt Lake City land, annexed in 1979, with Millcreek around it on every side.
Can I take a single pottery class instead of joining?
No. Monthly membership is the only way in. If you want a one time experience, Salt Lake Pottery Studio runs them and is closer to you than we are.
Do I need my own tools or clay?
No tools. Membership covers the wheels, the hand building tables, the slab molds, the glaze wall and the classes. Clay is by the bag and firing is charged by the size of the piece.
Do you take beginners?
Most of the room has been doing this under a year. Every instructed class has instructors working it.
What are the class times?
Instructed classes Monday through Thursday evenings plus Monday daytime. Friday evening and both weekend mornings are open studio. No odd and even day rules.
What happens if you join this week
You pick a level, sign the waiver, and turn up to your first class. Somebody shows you where everything is, you get a shelf, and you put your hands in clay the same night. Most people who come from Millcreek and join here have never touched a wheel.
- Nothing to bring. What to wear is covered on the what to wear page.
- The first day page walks through the whole first visit, in order.
- Free lessons for everything else live in Clay Hole University, whether or not you ever join.
Questions are quickest by text. The studio line is 385-241-5528. We are at 12896 S Pony Express Rd, Suite 100, Draper, UT 84020.