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The Clay Hole University Ā· Project Guides

Ceramic Tiles That Stay FlatPrintable pottery guide

The whole method for keeping a flat square of clay flat, in the order you do it, with the two steps everybody skips called out where you will actually be standing.

$10.005 guides, 1 free
  • Skill level: Beginner
  • 31 printable pages
  • 10 video picks
  • 7-question quiz + answer key

Flip through the free sample
  • Instant download
  • Prints on any printer
  • The lesson stays free
The printable, at a glance

What is the Ceramic Tiles That Stay Flat printable guide?

It is the tile method on paper: why a tile curls at all, which clay bodies stay flattest, how thick to roll, how to compress both faces, why you cut on the board you will dry on, the three drying stages, and how to glaze and fire something flat. It ends with a diagnosis page for the six ways it goes wrong, a batch log to write in, a one page summary for the bench, a glossary and the full quiz with an answer key that explains every answer.

Prefer to read it online first? The ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ lesson is free, and always will be.

  • 31printable pages, US Letter
  • 7quiz questions, with a full answer key
  • 10hand-picked videos, each with a QR code
  • 18glossary terms in plain language
  • 2workbook pages you fill in yourself
For the thing that goes wrong overnight

Tiles do not fail while you are watching

A tile is the first thing most people make and the first thing most people throw away. You roll a slab, cut some squares, and they look perfect. You go home. In the morning the edges have lifted and one of them has a crack straight across the middle, and nobody was there to see which part went wrong.

That is what makes tiles frustrating in a way that a wobbly mug is not. On the wheel, the mistake happens in your hands and you feel it. With a tile the mistake happened last night, or at the roller two days ago, and the piece in front of you is only the receipt.

So this guide is built backwards from that. It names the one mechanism that causes nearly all of it, then gives you the six steps that take it away, then gives you a page that works the other direction: here is what came out of the kiln, here is what caused it, here is what to do differently. Keep it beside you and the guessing stops.

Look inside

Real pages, for a wet bench and a drying shelf

These are actual pages from the guide, shown here with the sample watermark.

  • Page 5 of the ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ printable guide: the one idea, drawn, shown with the sample watermark
    The one idea, drawnA tile curls toward whichever face dries first. The diagram and its numbered key sit side by side, so you can see the mechanism before you read a single instruction.
  • Page 8 of the ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ printable guide: how thick, and the eight moves, shown with the sample watermark
    How thick, and the eight movesThe thickness numbers as cards you can find at a glance, then the eight things to do at the slab roller so you do not roll a warp into the slab before you start.
  • Page 19 of the ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ printable guide: six ways it goes wrong, shown with the sample watermark
    Six ways it goes wrongWork the other direction. Find what came out of the kiln, read what caused it, and take the two fixes printed on the card.
  • Page 23 of the ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ printable guide: every batch, and how it came out, shown with the sample watermark
    Every batch, and how it came outYour clay, your thickness and your room are not in any book. Write down eight batches and the third one usually behaves.
Flip through the free sampleTen pages, free, no email required.
Why this one belongs on paper

Your hands are covered in slip and the tile is on a board

Almost everything that decides a tile happens while you are standing at a table with wet clay on both hands, or at a shelf at the end of the night. Neither is a good moment for a phone.

  • It does not go dark

    A page does not time out between passes with a rib. You set it down, do the thing, and it is still open at the step you were on.

  • It goes on the shelf, not in your pocket

    The drying section is the part you need at eleven at night when you are deciding whether to put a board on top. Pin that page above the shelf and it is there.

  • You can write on it

    The batch log is the point. Clay, thickness, how it dried, whether it stayed flat. Three batches of that beats any amount of reading.

  • Wet thumbs do not scroll

    Nobody has ever scrubbed back through a video with a clay-covered hand to find the part about which way to rotate the slab. A list holds still.

How this one is built

Rebuilt for paper, not printed from a web page

Every guide in the series is set from scratch for print. Here is what that meant for this one.

  • The mechanism first, then the steps

    The curl diagram and its numbered key are on one page, side by side, because a key that lands on the page after its diagram is no key at all. Everything after it refers back to that one idea.

  • The clay table checked against the bags

    Every shrinkage figure was read off the manufacturerā€™s own description on our product pages rather than taken from the lesson, and two of them turned out to be wrong. The table is in shrinkage order so you can find your bag in it.

  • The steps where your hands are

    Six steps, each one a short numbered list with the reason underneath, so you can read the reason once and then work off the list.

  • A diagnosis page that works backwards

    Six cards, each one a thing that came out of the kiln, with the cause named and two fixes printed on it. This is the page people actually use.

  • A one page summary for the bench

    At the roller, at the table, drying and firing, plus the two step lists in full. One page, nothing else on it.

  • Codes that go somewhere

    Every video, every related lesson and the free lesson itself has a code you can scan and a link you can type, and every one of them is our own address rather than a redirect through somebody else.

Why the University is free

The lesson is free. It always will be.

All of the teaching in this guide comes from the free ā€œCeramic Tiles That Stay Flatā€ lesson, and that lesson is not going anywhere. What you are paying for is the paper version: rebuilt for print, checked line by line, with the workbook pages and the answer key.

A tile is the first thing most people make and the first thing most people throw away, and for a while I thought that was just how tiles went.

It is not. Four things matter and all four are easy to skip, because none of them tells you off until two days later.

Rib the back. Cut where it will dry. Put a board on top. Wait longer than you want to.

Dan Pearce, founder of The Clay Hole
The series

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Every printable guide in The Clay Hole University series takes one free lesson and rebuilds it for paper, with workbook pages, a glossary and a quiz with a worked answer key. Each one keeps its number for good, so a guide you buy today is the same guide in the same place next year.

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Sits next to

Three lessons that pick up where this one leaves off

Each one is free to read online, and the codes in the guide take you straight there.

Questions

Good to know

How is this different from the free lesson?
The teaching is the same, and the free lesson is not going anywhere. The guide is that teaching set for paper: the diagram and its key on one page together, the steps as lists you can work off with wet hands, a diagnosis page, a batch log to write in, a one page summary for the bench, a glossary and the full quiz with an answer key that explains every answer. A few figures were also corrected on the way, and those corrections went back into the free lesson too.
What do I need to print it?
Any home printer. It is set for US Letter with margins that stay inside what a standard printer can reach, so nothing is lost at the edges. There is nothing to cut out and nothing to assemble.
Does it work in black and white?
Yes. It was checked in grayscale as well as colour. Nothing in it depends on a colour to be readable, and the diagram is a line drawing.
Can I just read it on a screen?
You can, and it works. It is a normal PDF and it reads fine on a tablet. We built it for paper because a tile is decided at a bench and at a drying shelf with clay on your hands, but nobody is going to stop you.
Can I print only part of it?
Yes, and most people do. The one page summary and the diagnosis page are the two worth having on the wall. The batch log is the one worth having on a clipboard.
Is this too early for me?
No. Tiles are where most people start, and this one is marked Beginner. There is no difficult movement anywhere in it. What makes tiles fail is that four of the steps look optional at the time, which is exactly what the guide is for.
Do I need a slab roller?
No. A rolling pin and two guide sticks of the right thickness give you a beautifully even slab, and because you work in short strokes from several directions it can build in less directional memory than a machine does. The guide covers both, and the roller section is eight moves you can skip if you do not have one.
How does delivery work?
It is a digital download. The link arrives the moment the order goes through, and it is yours to keep and to print as many times as you like on your own devices.
What happens when the guide is updated?
Every edition carries its version number on the last page, and the guide has a code that always points at the newest one. If we correct something, you can check what you have against what is current.
Can I share it?
It is licensed to you, the person who bought it. Print it for yourself as many times as you want, on as many of your own devices as you want. Please do not upload it, post it or resell it. If you would like to use it with a class or a group, ask us and we will sort something out.

Flat is a process, not a talent

Rib the back. Cut where it will dry. Put a board on top. Wait longer than you want to. Do those four once in the right order and the mystery goes away permanently.

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