Our June Studio Journal
Here’s a round-up of posts from our June Studio Journal.
Wednesday 1st June
The month begins with a poem, heartbreakingly relevant more than a century on, although I for one am thinking about roses a lot!:
June, 1915, by Charlotte Mew
Who thinks of June's first rose today?
Only some child, perhaps, with shining eyes and
rough bright hair will reach it down.
In a green sunny lane, to us almost as far away
As are the fearless stars from these veiled lamps of town.
What's little June to a great broken world with eyes gone dim
From too much looking on the face of grief, the face of dread?
Or what's the broken world to June and him
Of the small eager hand, the shining eyes, the rough bright head?
In smaller news, today has been all about getting back into the swing of things after half term, gearing the studio back up to full production. June is traditionally a quiet month for us, so we will try to resist a sense of panic and embrace the time to develop thoughts, ideas and make plans. The ‘Christmas’ word has already been raised. We start to plan now, in our own militant way.
Friday 3rd June
I can’t say life feels simple or calm right now. My head is swimming with big life events (largely, selling our home, buying another) and just the general emotional rollercoaster that is parenting and running a small creative business. But all of these afford us great privilege so I try to keep my anxiety to the minimum. It’s a great pleasure to lose the hours in production, in a repetitive, slow task. There’s a lyric that stays with me from a King Creosote song, “Bored, yet busy with my hands’. I think this state is one of my favourite places to be as an adult required to balance and multi-task. For the coffee pour overs we couldn’t fit our maker’s mark on the base, so today I spend some time hand drawing it, along with the date. I’m using red iron oxide and water - the humblest of materials - but using a brush to write is harder than it looks and I must concentrate hard.
It’s the Jubilee but Matt and I have chosen to work today, not because of political ideologies, more that we have childcare and it is a genuine pleasure to be here with Matt, working on this collection. Luna is still in America, we’re missing her!
Monday 6th June
The nursery is closed so our day is a little staggered, but I come to the studio to get ahead for the coffee collection launch tomorrow. After so much to-ing and fro-ing, will they, won’t they, and an old wives tale-esque trick using toilet paper, clay slip and vinegar, the coffee pour overs cracked. Matt knew they would, but I had held out hope. Many hours of work redundant. But we learn, we move on. We open up for pre-orders and we make again.
Thursday 9th June
Pick up pot, wrap, book in postage - repeat. Lots of orders coming through this week for the launch of our Father’s Day / Coffee Collection. I’m obviously really pleased about that. Tomorrow is the launch of a little collection we’ve been working on for Piglet in Bed too. It’s been a genuine pleasure to work with the team there on this small body of work, including a tapered mug, cereal bowl and jug, all with a hand-painted cobalt stripe. I won’t lie, it took a long time to get to the point where we felt happy with the stripe, but in the end I think we got the hand-drawn sensibility just right, especially over the very ‘washed’ look of our new speckled white glaze.
Friday 10th June
Luna’s first day back after her month long US trip, and we were also joined by photographers India and Magnus so the studio felt like a real hub of activity. I’ve asked them to create a series of colour exploration photographs for each of our glazes, as I’m working on some new ways of communicating our glaze and clay offerings digitally. It was wonderful watching them work, grouping pots together and picking out non-ceramic items from our studio to create an assemblage - a study of colour. We decided to celebrate the variations and complexities with each glaze rather than try to take high-tech colour accurate photos, as we felt this approach could be misleading. There are many ideas we’re working on at the moment behind-the-scenes, this is just one of them.
Wednesday 15th June
I filmed and edited a video of Luna throwing a ramen bowl. Whilst editing, I found it really relaxing to watch, so in the end I decided to edit minimally, keeping the sounds of the studio present, and not shortening it too much. Luna worries it will be too boring for people to watch, as there is much repetition and slow-ness in the process, but I think that it is just what the world needs right now. True craftsmanship in real time. Good things take time. Preach!
Thursday 16th June
Our June Studio Playlist (writing the songs out as below, completely inspired by Ali Hewson, bringing all the analogue vibes. But you can listen here.
Lost Track, HAIM // Big Wheel, Samia // Change, Big Thief // Nashville, CMAT // Summer Girl, HAIM // idkwntht, Tomberlin // Unnecessary Drama, Belle and Sebastian // Sunburn, Sylvan Esso // Yards / Gardens, Kate Bollinger // Everything I had, Sun June // Hannah Sun, Lomelda // Lester Leaps In, Oscar Peterson // Valleys, Nubya Garcia // Cosmic Egg, Oscar Jerome, Ben Hauke // I’ll Stay, The RH Factor, D’Angelo // Save Tonight, Eagle-Eye Cherry // Train Song, Feist, Benjamin Gibbard // The Pirate’s Gospel, Alela Diane // Cargill, King Creosote // Even After All, Finley Quaye // Lebanese Blonde, Thievery Corporation // Yo Mae Leh, Invisible Minds // Juliane, Lionel Belaso & His Orchestra // Be on My Side, Melanie Charles, Mejiwahn // Some Other Time, Bill Evans
Friday 17th June
It is HOT. Our studio is like a glasshouse in the summer afternoons. We go out for ice cream, spritz ourselves, try to keep the kiln firings for the cooler days and weekends. We’re all wearing shorts! Matt and Luna are really busy throwing the first batch of the new plinth vases which we’ve been prototyping for a while. They’re hard to throw due to their size and shape. Lots of swearing. I offer to film Matt throwing, capturing all the ones that don’t make it, the tumbled and crumpled scraps of shiny wet clay, plonked with disdain into the reclaim bucket. And the swearing. The bowls seem to all go wrong at the same point, tantalisingly close to the finish line. Regardless of it all, we are laughing, we love what we are making and I believe wholeheartedly in this new form. I am spent, physically, emotionally - mainly because of lack of sleep and the heat - so I enjoy a happy hour of mark-making on some fat bellied vases (a random batch of vases Matt threw to cheer himself up when the coffee pour overs cracked). Yes - we may work hard at this, but pottery is still our salvation.
Sunday 19th June
A happy day. We celebrated the fathers in our lives and lit the wood-fired bread oven at my parents house. We welcomed the beautiful Ukrainian family who have come to live in my sister’s home and our children play together. We eat pizza, cake, drink wine - happy days.
Saturday 25th June
Our Seconds / Sample sale is open for business. I am so happy to see Carla after quite a few weeks. I hope for a nice chat and gossip but no time! The doors open at 11am and we don’t stop to look up until about 1. The best thing about these events is meeting people you only know about online. A customer from Manchester made the trip, and made my day. A woman attending the train strike bought armfuls of pots. Customers who are more like friends came to say hi. It was a happy day. The majority of pots sold, but we’ve got a lot of teapots left so I’m planning a special teapot seconds sale, online. Got home to read about the apocalyptic news from the US.
Wednesday 29th June
A poem to end the month. A busy month full of work, of striving even though tired, of looking forward to a break and being proud as punch of the new work we’ve made, the sales we’ve achieved, the month started out a little aimless, a little distracted, we’ve kept to the narrative, we’ve formed a plan, the plan is working, we’re doing this. But we all need a day off, and despite my work ethic, my inner self will understand. Won’t it? This is why I like this poem, by Ogden Nash.
I didn't go to church today,
I trust the Lord to understand.
The surf was swirling blue and white,
The children swirling on the sand.
He knows, He knows how brief my stay,
How brief this spell of summer weather,
He knows when I am said and done
We'll have plenty of time together.