June Firing

Well, we squeezed a small firing on June 9th, tried to get the our large pit, but it was a fun challenge in the 4x4.  We opted to continue to work on our firing in fire pits.  They are much smaller, and easier to control, however we do not reach the same temperature range as we do in the large pit, but is much, much faster.  I've decided to call this new firing "Fire Pit Pottery", since it is faster and much lower temp, we increased the amount of colorants to compensate.  Each piece is individually wrapped in paper with the colorants next to the piece and placed in the fire pit.  once the pit is full with fill the gaps with sawdust and small pieces of wood and light it up.

The results are darker than our normal pit fired pieces, but still have the complex layers and patterns.  We did a couple last year this way because of the drought, but have decided to keep the process and continue to play with it.

New Booth Design

This year we have taken a step back from shows, free up some time to redesign our booth.  It has been a challenge so far, eliminating the tables with skirts and the accordion style shelving.  We wanted to get away from the tables, as they were too long for most vehicles, besides they were beginning to warp and have dips.  The skirts were getting stretched out and needed new elastic.  I cannot complain, I spent less than $60 for the two tables, and I still have the saw horses to use for other things.

The accordion style shelving is very functional, easy to set up, and has stood up to very strong winds without being tied or weighted down.  I have turned down several offers to purchase it, but still keep it around.  You never know when it will come in handy.  It just was not the look I wanted.  I know it sounds rather snobbish, but it didn’t fit in with the look we wanted.  It’s my booth, and I’ll make it how I want it.

The 1^st booth set up was out of necessity, very little to no funds and was built as inexpensively as possible.  Now we have a little more money and experience to see what would work for us.  Here are some of our criteria:

1.      Collapsible/ easy to set up and tear town

2.      Light enough to carry, heavy enough to withstand wind gusts

3.      Unique, something that is as unique as our pottery

4.      Storage, still needed to store items in the booth

5.      Must fit in the Expedition and leave room for pottery

6.      Must be affordable, sorry $1200 for basic Pro Panels is out of our range.

I started brainstorming a little over a year ago, and really started to look at other people booth set ups, and searching the internet for ideas.  By last fall I knew I wanted to do something with natural edge wood.  I purchased a 16” locust log and had it milled into planks.  I have since made a set of 70” shelves using 4 of the planks with all their imperfections left to shine and scream uniqueness.  The brackets for this set is down with square tube steel and it is all bolted together, takes about 5-10 mins to set up/take down.

 Now working on some pedestals, this spring’s ice storm was a great source for cross sections of trees.  These will soon be our pedestals.  It was one of the positives from the ice storm in April.  For those of you who know wood, I did kiln dry the cross sections so I could work with them.  That’s an added bonus for having those kilns in the garage.

 We also selected a curtain material to divide a section of the boot to hide the boxes and misc supplies, designed the support system for it and almost ready to test it out on a mock set up.

Lastly still on the hunt for the other shelving set, I have the designs I want.  I just need to figure out how to do it.  Besides I still have firings to do and pots to make for our shows this season.  I will post pictures after the 1st show, until then there are and will be more sneak peaks on our facebook page.