These picture's are the view from my flat above the pottery. The temptation to take numerous photograph's is too much, just cant help myself.
We've had such good weather recently, which is unusual for the west coast of Scotland. It's been over 3 weeks now of sunshine with the occasional shower :) fingers crossed it lasts.
Hugh & I have been busy trying shape's that are new to us. Alan had always made certain shape's & vice versa so it has been a challenge to both of us to keep the full range stocked up.
Here are some of the cut handled bowls that you may have seen Alan doing on his blog. These are Hugh's bowls which have turned out great, I'm sure Alan would be pleased with them.
Here I am trying out the salad servers as there is only 1 left in the shop & they sell well in the summer, so now is as good a time as any to give them a go.
Was nice to throw with a larger lump of clay for a change, don't know what it is but I find big pots easier to throw. Was pleased with how they turned out, fingers crossed I'll still feel the same after they are fired.
I was out walking today with the 2 dog's & heard a lamb bleating & bleating as if it was shouting & balling, when I turned round to see what was going on it was standing at the top of the hill looking straight at me.
Next thing it started running through the field towards me, I couldn't tell if it was happy or angry until it reached me & seemed so happy to see me, just like the dog's when i come back to work after the weekend.
It loved getting a good scratch, especially round it's horn's that were just growing in but felt a bit strange clapping a sheep.
This 1st pic is when the kiln was just put into reduction, it gives a nice dark flame.
Where this 2nd pic shows our reduction flame pretty much at end temperature about 1300C.
The 1st dragon nearest you was at the top back, 2nd top front & the 3rd at the bottom front, gives you an idea of the hottest & coolest parts of the kiln.
A wee action shot of Hugh cutting the wood in between heavy showers for the firing.
Some of Alan's large cup's in granite with iron oxide decoration.
The pottery is stacked high with pots waiting to get fired as the weather has been bad for the past couple of weeks & we haven't even been able to cut enough wood never mind fire the kiln.
A lot of these pots are shape's Hugh & I have never tried before but we seem to be managing anyway, we'll see when they have fired. Fingers crossed :)
As you can see from these pictures, spring has definitely sprung here at Argyll Pottery.
We had a couple of weeks of great sunshine :) then came the down poures of heavy showers :( so it's been great weather for the flowers.
Hugh cant keep up with cutting the grass, was cut 2 weeks ago & is already looking wild.
Hope you all enjoy looking at our pic's of the pottery garden as much as we enjoy the garden :)
All guns a blazing :) this is our chimney puffing away about half way through our 16 hour firing.
We wait for two days to let the kiln cool down at a nice pace, then we get to start removing bricks & revealing the results. This is always an exciting time.
