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The Clay Hole University · Project Guides

Pitchers and Ewers That Actually PourPrintable pottery guide

The whole pitcher, in the order you make it: why the water runs down the front, the last two millimeters of the spout that decide it, four ways to build one, and the week of drying and glazing that can quietly undo it.

$10.005 guides, 1 free
  • Skill level: Advanced
  • 32 printable pages
  • 9 video picks
  • 6-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 Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour printable guide?

It is the pitcher on paper: what the teapot effect is and why a thick rounded lip hands the water a road down the front of the pot, the four things that decide whether it pours, a body worth putting a spout on, four ways to make the spout and which one fits which pot, the pulled spout in nine steps, the undercut that finishes it, a handle that lines up with the spout, and how to dry, trim, glaze and test it without losing the edge you cut. Built to be printed, ticked off and kept beside the wheel.

Prefer to read it online first? The “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” lesson is free, and always will be.

  • 32printable pages, US Letter
  • 6quiz questions, with a full answer key
  • 9hand-picked videos, each with a QR code
  • 23glossary terms in plain language
  • 2workbook pages you fill in yourself
For the pot that has to let go

Nobody throws a bad pitcher. They leave a soft edge on a good one

Most people can throw a pitcher. The wall is fine, the belly is fine, the handle fits the hand, and the first time it is filled and tipped, the tea goes down the front and onto the counter. It is the most common reason a handsome pitcher ends up at the back of the shelf.

Nothing about the inside of the pot caused it. It happened in the last two millimeters of the spout, where a rounded lip gives the water a surface to follow around the corner. A sharp outside edge gives it nothing to hold on to, and a fingernail can tell you which one you have made.

Making that edge takes about four seconds. Keeping it takes a bit more care: how the spout is pulled, how it is wrapped while it dries, and where the glaze goes. That is what the guide is for, and it is the difference between a pitcher that looks right and one that pours.

Look inside

Real pages, for a bench with a sink beside it

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

  • Page 3 of the “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” printable guide: before you begin, shown with the sample watermark
    Before you beginSix boxes on one page: what you will learn, what to have on the bench, what is worth knowing, the common pitfalls, what success looks like and how to practice. Read it before you throw and again before you glaze.
  • Page 7 of the “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” printable guide: the four that decide it, shown with the sample watermark
    The four that decide itRim thickness at the spout, a sharp outside edge, a spout that is the high point, and a channel with real depth. Everything else about a pitcher is taste; these four are function.
  • Page 19 of the “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” printable guide: nine ways it goes wrong, shown with the sample watermark
    Nine ways it goes wrongFind the symptom, read the cause. Most of them were decided at the wheel, days before they showed, which is the annoying part and also the useful part.
  • Page 25 of the “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” printable guide: every pitcher, and how it poured, shown with the sample watermark
    Every pitcher, and how it pouredA log to write in: the spout you chose, how wide you made the channel, whether a fingernail caught, and what the pour test said at bisque. The second pitcher starts from a number instead of a memory.
Flip through the free sampleTen pages, free, no email required.
Why this one belongs on paper

You will be reading it with slip on your hands

A spout is pulled in about ninety seconds, then the pitcher waits days for everything else. Paper suits both halves.

  • It holds still

    A page stays exactly where you left it while you steady a soft rim with two fingers. It does not go dark, and it does not need slip wiped off the screen.

  • A week in the middle

    The dangerous part is the week between the wheel and the bisque, when a thin spout and a thin handle dry faster than the belly they hang on. That is a list to pin above the shelf, not a video to find again.

  • A test you can write down

    The pour test at bisque takes thirty seconds at a sink and tells you everything while you can still fix it. The guide has a page to record what it said, next to the spout you chose.

  • It goes beside the wheel

    Three short tick lists, before the spout exists, at the rim and before it goes on the shelf, are set to sit next to the wheel with a pencil beside them.

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 physics, checked

    The lesson says the teapot effect was named in 1956 and only fully explained in 2021. We checked the history and the three factors it names against the published work, and both hold up.

  • Every video, read

    We read the description and chapter list of all nine videos against the note beside each one. One note had the butter trick in Florian Gadsby’s spout video the wrong way round, and the guide now says what the video says.

  • Two rules, put back

    The glazing list now says a kiln cookie or glaze catcher goes under the pot every time, and that the glaze on the inside of a pitcher has to be one rated for food.

  • The picker, turned into text

    On the web, four buttons choose which spout suits a first pitcher, a tall ewer, a wide low jug or a little sauce pourer. On paper all four answers are printed, each opening with the pot it is for.

  • A quiz that explains itself

    Six questions, and an answer key that gives the reason behind every answer rather than only the letter.

  • Codes that keep working

    Every link is a short Clay Hole address. If a video moves, we repoint the address and your printed copy still goes to the right place.

Why the University is free

The lesson is free. It always will be.

All of the teaching in this guide comes from the free “Pitchers and Ewers That Actually Pour” lesson, and that lesson is not going anywhere.

Everybody has one. It was a gift, or somebody’s first pot, and it lives behind the good glasses because when you tip it the tea goes down the front and onto the counter.

The whole failure is one edge nobody knew to look at. I find that reassuring. It means the fix is small, and it means you already have the hands for it.

Your future self, standing at the table with a full pitcher, will never know how close it was.

Dan Pearce, founder of The Clay Hole
The series

Build a little pottery library

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.

Put any five printable guides in your cart and the cheapest one is on us. Put in nine and the two cheapest are on us. It happens automatically at checkout, no code to remember.

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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 rebuilt for paper: a learning dashboard at the front, the four methods with the spout that suits each pot printed out, three tick lists for the wheel, a pitcher log to write in, a one page summary, a glossary and a quiz with an answer key that explains every answer.
Do I need a wheel?
The guide is written for the wheel, and the pulled spout in nine steps assumes a thrown rim. The physics and the undercut apply just as much to a hand built pitcher, though, and one of the nine videos is a slab built pitcher, so the guide is still worth having if that is how you work.
Is this too early for me?
It is marked Advanced, because a pitcher stacks three things: a tall clean cylinder, a rim thin enough to pull, and a handle that agrees with the spout. The spout itself is about ninety seconds of work. If you can throw a straight cylinder with an even wall, the guide points you at the most forgiving of the four methods first.
What if my pitcher already dribbles?
The guide has a section for exactly that. At bisque, a wet sanding pad will crisp up the outside edge in under a minute, and you can re-test. After the glaze firing it is a harder fix and the guide is honest about the cost, a dulled band across the glaze.
Do I need a fancy printer?
No. It is set for an ordinary home or office printer on regular US Letter paper, with nothing important near the edges, so normal printer margins cut nothing off.
Does it print in black and white?
Yes. It is designed to stay readable in grayscale, and the pages you will actually use at the wheel, the tick lists and the one page summary, were checked that way on purpose.
Can I print just part of it?
Yes, and most people do. The tick lists, the one page summary and the pitcher log are the three worth having by the wheel. They are numbered pages like any other, so you can print those and leave the rest on a screen.
Can I read it on a screen instead?
Yes. It is an ordinary PDF and it reads fine on a tablet or a phone. The workbook pages are the ones that want paper, because you write on them.
Do I have to be at a studio to use it?
No. Where the guide says something that is true of The Clay Hole, our firing cones for example, it says so and names the studio, so a reader working anywhere else knows which parts are a rule of the craft and which are ours.
How does delivery work?
It is a digital download. The link arrives by email and on the order confirmation page right after checkout, so you can have it printed and beside the wheel the same evening.
What happens if the guide is updated?
Every edition carries its version number on the last page. When we correct or improve one, the new edition replaces the old one in the shop, and we can send the updated link to anybody who already bought it.
Can I share it?
It is licensed for your own use. Print as many copies for yourself as you like, on as many of your own devices as you like. Please do not pass the file on, upload it or use it with a class or a group without asking us first.

Cut the corner, then check it with a fingernail

The spout is ninety seconds of work, and the guide is the rest of what stands between that spout and a pitcher that pours: the thin lip, the sharp edge, the wrapped tip, the careful dip and the test at the sink. Do those and the tea goes into the cup. Skip one and it goes down the front, which is why this one is worth reading before you pull the spout rather than after.

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