You can move this picture: drag it, press and hold then drag on a touch screen, or use the arrow keys.Printable guide 06.11

The Clay Hole University · Advanced Throwing

Throwing PlatesPrintable pottery guide

A plate is mostly floor, and the floor is the part that cracks. The numbers, the twelve steps, and the week of drying that decides whether you keep it.

$5.005 guides, 1 free
  • Skill level: Advanced
  • 30 printable pages
  • 8 video picks
  • 8-question quiz + answer key

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

What is the Throwing Plates printable guide?

It is a printable workbook edition of The Clay Hole University’s free “Throwing Plates” lesson. It covers six sizes weighed and measured so you can start from a number instead of a guess, twelve steps from ball to finished rim, the compression habit that decides everything, four rims and what each one costs you, and the first week of drying, which is where more plates die than on the wheel. On paper it adds a row for every plate, a diagnosis section for the nine ways one goes wrong, a one page card for beside the wheel, a quiz with a full answer key, and a glossary.

Prefer to read it online first? The “Throwing Plates” lesson is free, and always will be.

  • 30printable pages, US Letter
  • 8quiz questions, with a full answer key
  • 8hand-picked videos, each with a QR code
  • 16glossary terms in plain language
  • 2workbook pages you fill in yourself
Why a printable, for this one

More plates die on the shelf than on the wheel

You can throw a good plate and lose it four days later. It is mostly floor, it is wide, it dries from the outside in, and that is a recipe for a crack that appears long after you stopped paying attention to it.

Which means the things that save a plate are habits, not moves: how you compressed the floor, how you set it down, what you covered and when. None of which you remember accurately a week later when you are looking at the crack.

So this guide is built to be open at the wheel and then to stay with the plate. The numbers written down while they are real, the first four columns of the log filled in at the wheel and the last two later, so the crack has something to point at.

Look inside

Real pages, for a pot that takes a week to find out about

These are actual pages from the guide, shown here with the sample watermark. The full guide has none.

  • Page 6 of the “Throwing Plates” printable guide: plates by the numbers, shown with the sample watermark
    Plates by the numbersSix sizes, weighed and measured, so you start from a real number and adjust to taste rather than guessing at the clay.
  • Page 12 of the “Throwing Plates” printable guide: four rims, shown with the sample watermark
    Four rimsEach one with what it costs you in difficulty, in drying and in how the plate actually gets used.
  • Page 18 of the “Throwing Plates” printable guide: nine ways it goes wrong, shown with the sample watermark
    Nine ways it goes wrongEach failure with what really caused it, and a box to tick for the ones that keep happening to you.
  • Page 20 of the “Throwing Plates” printable guide: the plate log, shown with the sample watermark
    The plate logThe first four columns filled in at the wheel while the numbers are real, and the last two filled in a week later.
Flip through the free sampleTen pages, free, no email required.
Paper beats the screen here

Why plates, of all things, belong on paper

A plate is decided by habits you cannot see and a week you are not watching. Paper is the only thing that connects the two.

  • It stays open while your hands are flat in a wide pot

    Prop it against the splash pan and check the compression rules mid session, because on a plate that is the one habit worth interrupting yourself for.

  • It records the numbers while they are still true

    Weight, diameter and floor thickness go down at the wheel. A week later, when the crack shows up, they are the only evidence you have.

  • It follows the plate onto the shelf

    The drying week has its own section, and the log has columns for what happened after the wheel, which is where most plates are actually lost.

  • One card lives by the wheel for good

    The six sizes, the twelve steps, the compression rules and the first two days of drying, on a single page you can pull out of the binder.

How the guide is built

Built for a pot that is won and lost a week apart

Every guide in the series is designed as a workbook first and a document second. For this one, that means:

  • A learning dashboard before page one

    What you will learn, what you need on the tray, the mistakes that get made first, and what a good floor actually feels like under the rib.

  • The complete lesson, redesigned for paper

    Four setup decisions, six sizes by the numbers, twelve steps from ball to rim, five methods, and four rims with what each one costs.

  • Compression, with a section of its own

    If you fix one habit on plates, it is this one. It gets its own section rather than a line inside a step, because it decides the rest.

  • The first week, and the last two chances to lose it

    Drying, trimming the foot, and the firing, where plates are the pieces most likely to get welded to a shelf.

  • Videos you can reach from a printed page

    Eight videos chosen for what they show rather than who made them, each with a note on why it is worth your time and a code that goes straight to it.

  • Plain words for the jargon

    A sixteen term glossary, from the marli and the corner to the S crack and slumping, written the way we would explain it at the wheel.

Why the University is free

The lesson is free. It always will be.

All of the teaching in this guide comes from the free “Throwing Plates” lesson at The Clay Hole University. No paywall, no sign-up, no catch.

Plates are the thing people ask for and the thing that breaks their heart, usually four days after they thought they had one. Knowing why should not cost anything, so the lesson stays free, for anybody, anywhere.

The University is free and stays free. The guides are the version rebuilt for paper with an unreasonable amount of care, and buying one keeps the free side going.

Thank you. Genuinely.

Dan Pearce, founder of The Clay Hole
Collect them

Build a little pottery library

Every guide carries a permanent number. This one is 06.11, the eleventh guide in Advanced Throwing. The series is designed to live together in a binder, section by section, so the craft ends up on your shelf in the order you learn it.

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.

See every printable guide

  • 5guides in your cart1 on us
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Where this leads

What to learn once a plate survives the week

These lessons pick up where this one leaves off. Each one is free to read now.

Good questions

Before you buy

Is this different from the free lesson?
The teaching is the same, and the free lesson is complete. The printable adds a row for every plate, a diagnosis section with boxes to tick, a one page card for beside the wheel, a printed quiz with an answer key, and a glossary.
Why do my plates crack across the middle?
Almost always the floor, either compression or drying, and usually both. It is the first thing the diagnosis section sorts out, because the fix is completely different depending on which one it was.
How much clay for a dinner plate?
The guide gives six sizes weighed and measured rather than one number, so you can start from the size you actually want and adjust to taste.
Do I need a bat?
Yes, and the guide is direct about it. A wide flat form is not something you want to be cutting off and lifting by hand, which is its own way to lose a plate you already threw well.
How long should a plate take to dry?
Longer than you want, and unevenly, which is the problem. The guide covers the first week in its own section because that is where more plates die than on the wheel.
Is this too advanced for me?
Plates are harder than they look, and the guide says so rather than pretending otherwise. If you can throw a bowl you would keep, you are ready to start losing some plates, which is how this goes.
I am not at The Clay Hole. Is it still useful?
Yes. It is about the form, the numbers and the drying, wherever you work. Anything specific to our studio is marked as ours, and the studio numbers carry the date they were true.
Do I need a fancy printer?
No. It is designed 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.
Can I print it in black and white?
Yes. Nothing depends on color, and we looked at the workbook pages in grayscale to be sure.
Can I use it on an iPad or laptop instead?
Yes. Every QR code in the guide is also a tappable link, so on a screen you just tap instead of scanning.
How do I get it after I buy?
Right after checkout you get a download link by email and on your order confirmation page. Each link works up to seven times.
What if the guide gets updated?
Every edition carries a version number. When we correct or improve a guide, everyone who bought it gets an email with the new edition at no charge.
Can I share it with my class or studio?
Please don’t. It is licensed for your own personal use. Anyone can read the full lesson free online, and the printable is here if they want their own copy.

Throw six. Keep the third one.

Print it tonight. Write the numbers down at the wheel while they are real, and come back to the log in a week when the plate tells you what it thought.

Get the printable · $5.00

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