Pottery Classes in the Salt Lake Valley
The Clay Hole is a community pottery studio in Draper, at the south end of the Salt Lake Valley. Wheels, hand building tables, slab molds, the glaze wall and four kilns, all on one monthly membership.
The valley is about twenty five miles end to end, which means nobody in it is more than about half an hour away. Membership is the only way in, and there are no drop-in classes.
Every city in the valley, by how long the drive takes
The Salt Lake Valley is the basin itself: the Wasatch on the east, the Oquirrhs on the west, the Traverse Mountains at the south end and the lake at the north. Here is all of it, sorted by drive rather than by alphabet.
Under fifteen minutes
Draper
The studio's own city.
Bluffdale
Two miles south of the door.
SunCrest
Straight down off the ridge.
Sandy
One exit north, or the surface streets.
White City
An enclave of under a square mile, ten minutes out.
Riverton
West across the valley floor.
South Jordan
North, and quicker than it looks on a map.
Daybreak
Bangerter, with the usual caveat about five o'clock.
Fifteen to twenty five minutes
Herriman
Southwest, under the Oquirrhs.
West Jordan
East on Bangerter and down.
Midvale
Up the freeway or up Main Street.
Cottonwood Heights
Off the bench and south. No traction law involved.
Murray
Fifteen minutes, and the only city on this list with a street named after a clay factory.
Holladay
South on Highland Drive or I-215 then I-15.
Millcreek
Twenty minutes, most of it freeway.
Taylorsville
The geographic middle of the valley, straight down.
Twenty five minutes or more
Kearns
Southeast, on a street grid an army laid out.
West Valley City
The second largest city in the state, and the longest run from the west side.
Magna
The far west corner. Half an hour and honestly a commitment.
South Salt Lake
Down I-15 from the Creative Industries Zone.
Sugar House
Twenty five minutes from the old brickyard.
Salt Lake City
The whole length of the valley, south.
Downtown Salt Lake
Half an hour, and the point is getting out of the city.
The Avenues
Off the hill first, then the freeway.
Alta and Brighton are in Salt Lake County but not in the valley, and they have their own answer on the Salt Lake County page.
The grid tells you exactly how far away anything is, and almost nobody uses it
Salt Lake's address grid starts at Temple Square and runs eight hundred address numbers to the mile. That is the whole system, and once you know it every address in the valley is a distance rather than a name.
The studio is at 12896 South. Sixteen miles of grid from zero, before you count the east and west.
It is a strange and useful thing to live somewhere where the street signs are a measuring tape. It also means nobody here ever has to guess at a drive, which is why these pages give real numbers instead of saying conveniently located.
Twenty five miles, mountain to mountain
The valley runs roughly twenty five miles from the Traverse Mountains at the bottom to the lake at the top, with the Wasatch on one side and the Oquirrhs on the other. It is a closed room with two doors at the south end, which is why the Point of the Mountain matters as much as it does.
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 million people, one basin, and everything in it inside half an hour
Most metropolitan areas are a sprawl you can get genuinely lost in. This one is a bathtub with mountains on three sides and a freeway down the middle of it.
The practical effect is that a studio at the south end is reachable from the north end on a weeknight, which is not true of most cities this size. The furthest corner of the valley is Magna, and Magna is half an hour.
So the real question is not whether you can get here. It is whether the thing at the other end is worth putting in the calendar, and that is a question about you rather than about the road.
- Seven days a week, so the drive fits the day rather than the other way round.
- Your own shelf, which is what makes a longer run from the north end workable.
- 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.
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 across the Salt Lake Valley
The valley has more ceramics teaching than the rest of the state put together. These are the ones worth knowing about before you look at us.
- Make your own
Petersen Art Center
Salt Lake City, and the biggest teaching operation in the valley: sixteen pottery sections at once and twenty electric wheels. Tuition $130 a class plus $40 clay and $30 tools. They say plainly they have had waiting lists on all pottery classes for some time.
- Make your own
Studio 1396 at The Front
Salt Lake City, a ceramics studio inside a climbing gym, open 8am to 9pm seven days a week, sixteen and over. Assisted and unassisted open studio and kiln firing services. It used to be members only and is not any more, which is the fact most out of date elsewhere on the internet.
- Make your own
Copper Kiln
Herriman, at the south end. Eight week courses at $270 with clay, firings and a weekly open studio day included, and you can join any week. The best value fixed course we found anywhere in the valley.
If a city studio has a seat for you, take it. Ours is the answer when they are full, or when you want a shelf of your own and a room that is open seven days rather than on a term.
What people from the Salt Lake Valley ask
How far is the studio from the north end of the valley?
About half an hour from downtown or the Avenues, straight down I-15. Magna in the far west corner is the longest run at roughly the same. Nothing in the valley is further than that.
Which cities have their own page?
Twenty four of them, listed above with the drive for each. If yours is missing it is either in Utah County or up a canyon, and both have their own region page.
Can I take a single pottery class instead of joining?
No. Monthly membership is the only way in, with no drop-in classes and no single sessions. Several valley studios do run one off classes and we name them on the city pages.
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 bought by the bag at the front desk.
Do you take beginners?
Most people who join have never touched a wheel. Every instructed class has instructors working the room, so nobody sits stuck for twenty minutes.
Is it worth coming from the far side of the valley?
At half an hour it works for somebody coming once or twice a week with a shelf of work going, and makes very little sense for once a month. That arithmetic is the same whichever direction you are coming from.
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 the Salt Lake Valley 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.