mafief

My mom and I both adore pottery. She has been taking pottery classes for around five years and getting pretty good. Below is one of her style of mugs. The handle was inspired by a tea cup from Azerbaijan and she’s been perfecting it. The outside is pressed with Queen Ann’s Lace and stained dark. The clay isn’t finished on the outside, so the surface is rough. The lip and inside are glazed robin egg blue and smooth.


The outside impression reminds of letters from the late 1800’s on parchment paper, which gave me an idea for a new mug. I wanted to write one of the Sherlock Holmes stories on the mug, stain the writing dark and have black inside glaze. Writing on clay is not easy, and I printed the words instead of using cursive. I’m very happy with myself that I kept things relatively straight, evenly spaced, and of similar size. Choosing the story and what line to write took longer than writing on the clay. In the end, I chose the beginning of The Dancing Men, because that domestic scene is one of my favorites. The dots represent paragraph breaks and will be filled with red to represent bullet holes (which I realize is a little gruesome, but oh well). I even got the little dancing men on the handle, because why not. ;)

Pre-writing. The sponge keeps the handle from drooping.


Post writing. Mug will need to dry completely and be fired


Post first firing after glazing and staining.


I love how this is coming out. The writing looks great and is exactly what I’ve been picturing. It’s still not done yet. We are waiting for the pottery studio artist to fire up her gas kiln. She doesn’t use it in the summer because it’s so hot.

Lastly, the best perk is collaborating with my mom on this project. :)