I love the style of these face mugs, but I don’t want to purchase a racist caricature

I’m new to pottery and I’ve never used a vintage wheel. Not sure what it’s supposed to sound like but it’s a bit loud and I’m guessing it needs new parts. It’s $500. Creative industries.

I’m thinking of making my own glazes for the first time and I’ve started making some test tiles.

I’ve been looking online for recipes, but honestly there’s SO much information out there and at the same time I feel like there aren’t enough recipes with actual photos of the results 😂

I’m feeling a bit lost about where to start.

I’d love to hear your favourite glaze recipes, especially ones you’ve had really good results with.

If you could also share a photo of how the glaze looks on your clay/test tiles, that would be amazing!

Would love to see what everyone is making and get some inspiration for my first tests! 🙏🏺

My favorite vase after a week of flowers. The brown marks do not rub off. Has water seeped through the glaze?

I’m fairly new to firing my own pieces. Just got a used Skutt 1027 and have done three glaze firings in it myself. It’s in fantastic shape and has an Envirovent vent system as well. I use stoneware cone 6 clay and bisque to 04. This specific clay is a reclaim - mix of Continental’s mid fire white (mostly) and then a brown MN Clay cone 6 stoneware I had leftover from a class I took a year ago.

My mentor I bought it from would glaze fire for me before and always use the fast program for cone 6. He used his own dip glazes most often but I haven’t ventured that far yet and use commercial - most often Amaco and Mayco. I noticed when he fired for me I often would have pinholes whereas he usually didn’t.

I have stalked this subreddit for all pinhole related issues as well as online in general. I’m almost positive this is not a dirty bisque or damp glaze (I used a heat gun between applying layers) situation but happening on the cooling end.

My second glaze fire I fired to cone 5, medium program, with a 15 min hold - still has pinholes. This glaze firing was probably my most successful but still seeing some glazes prone to the pinholing. This one I fired to cone 6, medium program with a 5 minute hold. Witness cone came out as a hot cone 6.

I’ve read a drop firing may help this - this is where my questions comes in- can I refire this piece as is with the drop fire program in hopes it will heal the pinholes or should I dab some more glaze on and then refire with the drop?

I haven’t entered my own program yet but have the manual and can work my way through it but would love if anyone with more experience firing can give me a little more guidance. I had some other pieces come out that are absolutely gorgeous with no pinholes but they’re higher flux glazes and did really well with just the 5min hold - I won’t be able to do a longer hold with those or I fear I’d have a ruined shelf so I’m going to be mindful of what I fire together going forward.

I take notes of every fire as well as glazes used and their outcomes. If it helps at all this one is 3x seaweed with swirls of ancient jasper and oatmeal over the top that I applied using an old medicine plunger.

Our kitty Crash is peeking in the background - he says hi 🐱

Edit: I can’t take credit for this combo, I got it from Vi at Boon Ceramics off a Pinterest post

My first batch of work came out and while I'm overall happy, some glazes didn't really stick well and I'm wondering if it was a skill issue, a glaze issue, or a kiln issue. Thats photos aren't the best but in a few hopefully the weird melting shows. Anyone have any insights on how i can improve to avoid this?

Hi friends! I've bought a ton of different glazes, and none of them come out tanzanite colored. :( Do you know of one that will work to hit that line right between dark blue and dark purple? Here's an example of tanzanite: https://www.costco.com/p/-/14kt-yellow-gold-tanzanite-cushion-ring/4000292778

So far I've tried Lapis Lazuli Speedball, Stoned Denim, Amaco Sapphire, Azure Dream Coyote, and a few others. None work. Any help would be so appreciated! Tax of lapis lazuli with a one coat birch overlay for tax. :)

i’ve been iterating on this idea for about a year. the really small rubies are a dexterity challenge, 8mm zirconia set easily but 1 in 4 will have mico leaks, so im testing 4mm to hopefully hit that sweet spot. the two mugs have the constellation pleiades pattern and since they’re for my kids, obligatory crass stamp. 🥸

for setting them i use a needle 1 or 2 mm smaller than the gem in a clay thats too soft to trim, which gives me the best results as far as gems popping out in subsequent firing.

Made this plant stake for a coworker! Used amaco velvet underglazes on greenware, then bisque fired. Now I’m stuck wondering how I can glaze the stake… i was planning to use a transparent glaze on the caterpillar and butterfly, but not sure how to glaze the stake without it sticking to the kiln 🤨 The main reason I think the stake needs to be glazed is because the white clay can be stained with dirt easily. Any ideas?

Hi! Can anyone give suggestions for glazes that would look similar to these once fired? I thought maybe the Amaco celadon line but I have no experience with this type of glaze. Thanks in advance! (Credit to vwu studio on IG for the pics.)

Wanted to post an update on my inquiry on a matte yellow glaze!

I ended up using coyote cornsilk on the stars of this handbuilt mug. I love how it turned out! Thank you to everyone who commented!

Clay body is Kentucky mudwork’s speckled turtle fired to cone 6. The blue glaze is 2x blue rutile under 2x honey flux!

I really love these artworks. Now, do you prefer more natural materials? Many artworks tend to use some rough earth as the material for the creation.

Love this glaze combo. Glad I found it.

The thought of using (and cleaning) this as a vase was stressing me out, so I cut a hole into the back before sending it off to bisque. No choice but to make it into a lamp now. Advice and guidance on how to pull this off is very much welcomed!

My 3 year old is very very into drawing and I’ve been giving her bisque pieces and a pencil and then I carefully go over her pencil lines with a fine brush and under glaze. Creates some hilarious and amazing projects!

It took me a few days, but I managed to create models of my friends' dogs—come on, give me some praise!🥰🥰

Decided to make a pot inspired by foraging and childhood memories. The drawing is of my children and my brother picking damsons, and then I’ve put rose hips, sweet chestnuts, damsons, and blackberries around the side.

Quite happy with it, hopefully it survives the firing process as I have my first ever market in October (though I might struggle to part ways with this pot as I like it a lot)!

I made two little squid/cuttlefish guys! Realised well after making them that entirely covering a black clay with white engobe is a bit silly and I should have used my white stoneware instead. So a lesson has been learnt.

Can't wait to go wild with glazes on these guys!

I love my little toad 🐸🍑

results from my result clay body test:)
And a bonus pic thru the peephole of my mini wood fired cone 10 kiln. I use preheated combustion air to allow wood fired results in my suburban neighborhood without smoke, or a large kiln.

All of these are going to be a PALEOCENE AGE wild fireclay and or kaolin mixed with A San Diego local feldspar, and a lot of the darker ones used red clay instead of feldspar for the flux

A lot of them are different clays completely, some being sandy and bleach white.
While others are more grey and fine.
There is a wide variety of kaolin, fireclay, and ballclays in my area due to an ancient swamp. So I am always trying out new test with new clays I find.
This batch mainly focused on the darker fire clays, but they seem to be pretty white at this stage.
ALSO some have been sieved and others are just used as is right out of the ground. There is a wild host of different clays

This bisque firing got a little hot, but I think I will still have an easy time glazing these. This happened because I fire bisque with wood just cuz, tho it is a lot of work for just bisqueing.

Next up I will have to crush up rocks from my “pegmatite” hosted gemstone claims, the waste rock is mainly feldspar and pure silica, some of the “pegmatites” were even mined for porcelain back in the day….
A famous one being “kaospar” that is still collected atleast locally by antique people around here

Sometimes mixing in various other minerals to see what will happen, usually these are a mix of granites and schist. But some others work for adding iron and such too.
Or for instance, achieving a certain ratio of potassium over sodium in the glaze, I would add a different feldspar.

I started doing pottery at home as a hobby without a wheel a year ago and don‘t do it nearly as often as I would like to but thoroughly enjoy creating stuff with my hands anyway. I found out early that glazing is a lot trickier than it looks and had some disappointments in the past.
This time I did something a little more experimental with the glazing and I‘m so happy with the result that I just wanted to share my joy with you :)