The rim ran wider than the wall could carry and the clay lost the centre. That is the whole craft: every millimetre of width is paid for in wall thickness. In class this happens twice an evening, and nobody minds.
A working pottery studio on Saltford Row. Eight wheels, two kilns, and a first lesson that ends with a pot of your own on the drying shelf.
Every session is hands-on from the first minute. Clay, tools, aprons and both firings are included unless the line below says otherwise.
Centring, opening the floor and pulling a wall — the three moves the whole craft stands on. You throw three or four pieces and keep the best one; we trim, bisque and glaze it for you. Ready to collect in about three weeks.
The same first lesson, booked as a pair: two wheels next to each other, one teacher between you, and a bottle of something cold at the wedging table afterwards. Both pots are fired and glazed.
Cylinders in week one, bowls in week three, lids and handles in week five. Twelve kilograms of stoneware, all firings, and the shelf your work lives on between sessions. Finish with six to eight glazed pieces.
Bring work made elsewhere. We check it for thickness and trapped air, load it into the next matching firing and call you when it is cool. Studio glaze dipping is $6 extra per piece; your own glaze is fine if you tell us the cone.
Before the wheel there was the coil: a rope of clay laid round and round, each ring pressed into the one below. It is still how we teach the shape of a pot — and it is what the wheel does in fast-forward.
Air pockets are the one thing a kiln will not forgive. Ten minutes on the table turns a bag of clay into an even, bubble-free lump.
On the wheel the wall rises in three pulls. By hand it rises in twenty-six rings. Same wall, different clock.
Firm enough to hold a foot ring, soft enough to cut. Covered in plastic so the rim does not run ahead of the base.
Back on the wheel upside down. The foot is cut, the weight drops by a third, and your initials go under it.
Eleven hours to 980 °C and a day to cool. The clay stops being clay and becomes a sponge that will take glaze.
Dipped, wiped clean at the foot, then 1240 °C. The surface you chose on a dry chalky pot finally shows up.
Once you can centre without help, the studio opens up: book a wheel, take a shelf, and use the kilns on our firing calendar.
Hand-building space, shared tools, one drying shelf for the day.
Your own wheel, bats and trimming tools. Bench check required once.
20 hours of wheel time, a named shelf, member firing rates and a locker.
Buff stoneware, 12.5 kg bag. Member firings billed by shelf space.
Everything on the shelf was thrown here and fired in our own kilns. Small runs, no two the same, and the glaze recipe is on a card in the box.
280 ml, thumb rest on the handle, matte sand glaze inside and out.
18 cm across, wood-ash glaze pooling green where the wall turns.
26 cm, thrown in two parts and joined at the shoulder. Watertight.
24 cm, stacking rim, dishwasher safe. Fired flat on a sanded foot.
KILN & CLAY started in 2015 with two second-hand wheels and a kiln that tripped the building's fuses. The grain store on Saltford Row still has its timber floor and its north window, which is the reason we took it: you can see the wall of a pot properly in that light.
Nina Halvard teaches the evening classes and mixes every glaze we use. Tomas Berg runs the kilns and the firing calendar. Between them they have loaded something close to nine hundred firings, and they still open the door slowly.
“We do not sell a finished object in two hours. We sell the two hours — and then post you the object three weeks later.”
I came in certain I would be the worst person in the room. Nina put her hands over mine for the first pull and after that I was fine. My bowl is not straight and I do not care — I use it every morning.
Booked the six-week course as a way out of a screen. By week four I was throwing cylinders that actually stood up. The shelf with your name on it does something to how seriously you take it.
Tomas fired twelve pieces I had made at home and told me honestly that two were too thick to survive. They survived. He still explained why they might not have, which is the part I wanted.
The old grain store with the red shutter. Park on Kiln Street; the yard is for kiln deliveries only.
| Monday | Closed — kiln day |
| Tuesday | 10:00 – 21:00 |
| Wednesday | 10:00 – 21:00 |
| Thursday | 10:00 – 21:00 |
| Friday | 10:00 – 21:00 |
| Saturday | 09:00 – 18:00 |
| Sunday | 11:00 – 16:00 |
Short nails, sleeves you can push up, and shoes that can meet clay. Aprons and towels are here. Long hair gets tied back at the door — the wheel head does not negotiate.
Tell us which session and when. We hold the wheel for 24 hours and confirm by email — no payment on this page.
We have pencilled you in. Nina will confirm by email within one working day.