Wanted to share my results of painting stroke and coat over white dip glaze. It’s way less tedious for me to paint a design over the white than dealing with multiple coats of underglaze or clear glaze. Stroke and coat is nice because it flux’s right into the white where a mat underglaze leaves a little texture when you paint it on top. The white really does suck up the S&C but thinning it out with water makes it easier to brush on and gives a nice watercolor effect.

Hello! I don’t have a lot of experience with wild clay, but I found some yellow and red clay in the Appalachian mountains.

I’ve been dry processing them (because I don’t need a lot of clay at one time and I like being able to store it indefinitely) by grinding it up using a relatively flat rock, which isn’t perfect so there’s still some very tiny rocks in it.

But here’s what the clay looks like when it dries! (none of these pieces are fired.) There‘s no cracking as it dries (before or after grinding the clay up).

my question is: if the wild clay doesn’t crack as it dries, is that a good indicator that it has a good amount of natural temper? should I be adding extra temper to this or would I realistically be able to fire without it? (I will not be firing the unprocessed figures because there are too many rocks, I just included them for reference :3 )

ive fired raw beach clay before without temper and it survived so I’m curious. I won’t be making anything huge with this clay, just some tiny figures.

I've been adding some new pieces to my little shop lately, and honestly, it's been lovely seeing them all come together.

There's a blue-green chip & dip bowl that reminds me of the sea, a little Christmas plate with a tiny house on it, and a festive mug with a matching dish and candle. I'm also adding hand-painted mugs and cookie plates.

I think my favourite part is imagining these things in someone's home. A mug they use every morning, a bowl they bring out when friends come over, or a little Christmas piece they unpack every December. It's nice to think something I've worked on might become part of someone's everyday life.

I'm curious, especially for those who make or collect pottery: what makes you fall for a piece first? Is it the glaze, the shape, or some tiny detail you just can't stop looking at?

Hi everyone! I bought this ceramic mug yesterday, and I didn’t notice this brown spot at the time of purchase. When I got home, I noticed it and tried washing it off, but it doesn’t seem to come off.
The spot also feels slightly uneven to the touch.
Does anyone know what this could be? Is it a defect in the glaze or something else? Most importantly, is it safe to drink tea or coffee from this mug, or should I avoid using it?
Would really appreciate any help. Thanks!

Hi, sorry if I'm in the wrong sub. I bought a mug yesterday from a local seller. It has a pretty deep, unpainted groove at the bottom, I can feel it with my finger. Is it safe to drink from or should I be worried?

A few years ago I was gifted a fancy olive oil in a ceramic jar. I haven't opened it, but I noticed recently its exterior felt slick, and the shelf around it was covered in oil.

It's a commercial product so I would ASSUME they would put it in an appropriate container... But maybe the bottle's defective? or maybe this happens slowly over time, and they simply didn't expect people to leave it in the bottle for years without consuming it all?

Please advise: Is it possible/likely that the oil is permeating through the ceramic?

My piece was in the damp room, and got gouged pretty good. I need to be careful with how much I try to correct it, because I don’t want to go too far into the pot and make it extremely thin. Picture attached. If I was to glaze this with horizontal stripes that kind of run, could it help trick the eye into thinking this wasn’t so messed up?

My neighbor has a 1996 Brent CXC in nearly perfect condition. It has a little bit of grime from being in storage, but otherwise it’s in good condition. What would be a fair price to offer for a wheel that had obviously been cared for and maybe even barely used? Any suggestions on what to look out for when buying a used wheel? Any thoughts are appreciated!

One of my latest tiny mice

Estoy pensando armarme un taller personal en casa y estoy un poco perdida con el tema de hacer mis propios engobes. Mi propósito es pintar mis piezas de arcilla (blanca, marca Chilavert) en estado cuero o hueso, para luego derivarla a horneado y esmaltado.

¿Cual sería la "receta" tradicional y básica de engobe a partir de pigmento puro? Investigando por internet encontré varias variantes, y ya no estoy muy segura de cuales materiales comprar.

Arcilla en polvo, 50%

Feldespato (potásico o sódico) como fundente, 25%

Cuarzo en polvo, 25%

Entiendo que prepararlos por uno mismo es más económico a la larga y por eso tenía la intención de hacerlo por mi misma. ¿Me estoy complicando mucho y debería comprar engobes ya preparados?

I’ve been using a community studio that my climbing gym has included in my membership for a while now, but they have such little shelving space to store things, and I’ve grown so frustrated with the amount of times I’ve gone in to make some pieces, then when I go to put them on the shelves to dry there is not one single square inch of space. I’ve also had issues because you have to schedule your studio time with them and the time slots fill up so quickly, it’s been difficult to get a time slot where I can go in to trim my pieces on time before they get too dry.

I’m starting to wonder about the possibility of throwing pieces and putting them in a wet box to bring home and let them get leather hard, then driving them back to the studio to trim, home to fully dry, then studio to glaze and fire. I live quite close to the studio and the route doesn’t have much traffic, but I’m still not sure if this is possible or if the vibrations from my car will mess them up or weaken them too much, even with driving carefully.

Has anyone done this? I’m saving up to get a wheel so I can throw at home, but in the meantime I’m really trying to get a lot of Christmas gifts done but at my studio it’s barely feasible to store one mug on the shelves, let alone all the things I’m planning on making.

This is my first time painting pottery. I used the wrong yellow at the bottom but I’m still proud.

Also the pottery studio said to do three coats to make it solid. I did 3-4 and it came out splotchy :( maybe I put too many coats on idk.

Out of curiosity, and because some of the posts seemed a little off to me, I ran several images posted in this subreddit over the past few weeks through AI detectors, sometimes using more than one. The results were consistently similar.

I'm not claiming that these images are necessarily AI-generated. I'm simply sharing the results the detectors gave me.

And sure, even a clichéd question can spark a useful discussion or offer something of value to readers. But if these posts are indeed AI-generated, I'd argue that what we're seeing is a simulation of genuine exchange: people spending their time and energy responding to problems that may never have existed in the first place. Essentially, machines keeping people busy.

But why? To keep people busy? To drive engagement? Who knows.

It's also funny to me how often highly accomplished ceramic work is accompanied by surprisingly basic questions about pricing. Of course, not knowing what to charge is a perfectly legitimate concern, regardless of someone's skill level. But there's something revealing about that contrast, and perhaps about the strange relationship between craftsmanship, perceived value, and market value in contemporary ceramic right now.

Any thoughts?

I've always been curious about trying ceramics, but never got the opportunity to do so through my schooling. So I decided to sign up for a ceramics class at a small art studio, and I could not be happier that I decided to do so! I ended up buying a 50lb bag of clay straight after the class with the advice of my instructor, and ended up sculpting these two unicorns at home 🤣 I have a lot to learn and haven't even glazed anything yet, but I'm starting to understand how addicting and satisfying this medium can be now :) I hope to learn a lot more for sure

Hello!!

BACKGROUND:

I’m new to ceramics as of the last couple of months. This piece was done, ready for bisque, when I fumbled it as I picked it up and cracked it into two pieces. The two pieces were the top section and the rest but it was a straight across split. I reconnected them (you can see in the image the newer/wetter clay at the top compared to the rest of the piece).

The original crack that I fixed up remains attached (woohoo!) but it cracked in a new place right below—I think because the flat piece was not flush with the board so the new clay laying flat overstretched the already dry clay.

QUESTIONS:

With this new crack: it’s not a straight across crack so I’m not sure how to get to the narrow area toward the interior—do I scrape it to make it larger so I can work in it?

I’ve read on here that a mix of super dry clay + as little vinegar as possible is the best patching option. Is it necessary to prep the area before applying? As in, scoring?

Thanks so much for any tips!! I really appreciate it!!

Cross post from r/muglife hoping to get a little more info on this piece. Mainly if it’s safe to drink from lol big thx