lori.

A long overdue job done: documenting the remnants of my rainbow lorikeet feather collection.

I'll be moving on from these designs when I begin making in my new studio next month, but if you ask nicely I can make select pieces on order. 

See them all on my website.

Big thanks to Ruth for lending me her shiny new camera!

[ramekin :: 5 cm high 10.5 cm wide]

[cup :: 10 cm high 8 cm wide]

[plate :: 2 cm high 16 cm wide]

[plate :: detail]

july.

[forever spooning]

[swedish inspiration]

manx spoons

I'm making stacks of these little guys for a special project later on this summer...

progress

It feels like an age since I painted feathers! The 'tall' vases seem to be progressing nicely...

The Studio is developing too - more inspiration pinned on the walls and a new set of shelves to keep me tidy!

(have I mentioned how downright giddily excited I am about my new studio?!?!)

Thursday = Mud Colony! Thanks Adriana!

miro feathers.

Last week I posted these photos on Facebook and I am blown away with the positive response. I'm not sure if it's the designs themselves, or the jump into a new style that has caught everyone's attention. Either way, it got me thinking and I returned to some sketchbook work that I started before Christmas - pulling apart the colour sections in my feather designs and simplifying them.

[miro feathers?]

I think I like them...do you?

Thursday = Mud Colony!

slab platters

I've had a few requests for larger pieces, like platters or fruit bowls, however my fledging throwing skills aren't up to making something that big, so I've been playing with simple slab platters;

It's lovely to have a wider area to play with the design composition.

spoons

It's difficult to pinpoint where the spoons first crossed my radar. It must be nearly 6 months now, that I've been aware of the seemingly increasing trend in ceramic spoons. I admired them, coveted them, but didn't want to make my own; don't be a copycat, I told myself. But I kept seeing them, finding them more and more lovely. Suddenly I thought: no one can copyright a spoon and my skills are relatively fledgling, no one will notice or mind if I make a few.

 So I sketched.

And I made.

[spoons cut from thin slab of clay and hand pinched into shape]

 I love.

However; I have no idea if they will hold their form during firing to 1270c? Are they small enough to evade slumping? I will certainly only glaze the top sides just in case...

[one other small motivation to this - perhaps if I put spoons in my bowls, unimaginative people will stop asking me 'what would I do with this bowl...?']

Thursday: Our Creative Spaces + Mud Colony.

painting

Building up stock for markets and my dear stockists.

my (dishy) creative space

Continuing on from last week's creative space, I've been painting bowls to match my new flat dishes.

I've had a few egg-related incidents this last week - one being accidentally stepping on a gecko egg on my studio floor :( I didn't even figure out what it was til 5 hours later and I was devastated! But the lady mother gecko living in the apartment must have returned, as I found this one in almost the same place on the floor of the studio yesterday! So tiny! (though yes, I KNOW, they are considered pests. Hush.)
More creative spaces over here and a new weekly meeting place for clay folk over here.

eggs

For weeks I've been aching for a new design. I love the lorikeet feathers, but I don't want to overdo them - I need to keep them special. Everything I thought of was too different, too unconnected. I want to keep some thread of correlation between all of my work. I wanted to extend the line, not abandon it.

Then I thought of the eggs. I've painted the feathers, then the birds, so it only makes sense to paint the eggs now. Completing the circle of life?

I also wanted to develop the feathers somewhat, make them softer and truer to the real form. I started with a soft grey wash, darkened around the feathers and eggs, then used a white underglaze for the egg with grey and blue shading and instead of black line work for the feathers I scratched a line into the clay and added the detailing in dark grey.

I can only hope that the colours behave themselves once glazed!

my (egg) creative space

Inspiring me this week: sparkling blood orange, sunshine, jacaranda blossom and discovering a new (to me) potter.

[sketchbook]

[lorikeet nests?]

 

[plates/shallow dishes]

[sliiiightly larger bowls]

More creative spaces over here.