6 week ceramic hand building course
Unlock your creative potential in this 6-week handbuilding ceramics course.
Perfect for those eager to explore the world of clay. Whether you're a complete beginner or have some experience, this course will guide you through essential techniques, helping you create unique and functional ceramic pieces.
Course Description:
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Skills: Begin with the fundamentals by creating a pinch pot to understand basic clay properties and shaping techniques. Transition to coil building, using coils to expand the form and build a bud vase. Focus on controlling thickness, shaping, and achieving smooth joins.
Activity: Create a pinch pot and use coils to build a bud vase, concentrating on even construction and clean finishes.
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Skills: Build on your coil construction skills by starting a small lidded pot. Emphasis will be on developing structure, proportions, and symmetry, ensuring the pot’s body is well-formed and stable.
Activity: Begin constructing the body of the pot using coils, with attention to creating a secure and balanced form.
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Skills: Complete your pot by refining its form and creating a sculptural lid. Focus on final touches, ensuring strong joins, and adding decorative elements that enhance the overall design.
Activity: Finish the lidded pot and design a sculptural, decorative lid that complements the form.
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Skills & Overview: Learn slab building techniques to create the base structure for a vase. Focus on rolling even slabs, cutting precise shapes, and securely joining them to form solid, geometric forms.
Activity: Begin designing and constructing a vase using slabs, ensuring accurate cuts and clean joins.
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Skills: Continue refining your slab-built vase, focusing on shaping the form and ensuring its structural integrity. Prepare the surface for decorative techniques to be applied in the final week.
Activity: Continue building your vase, refining the shape and preparing it for decoration.
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Skills: Learn decorative techniques such as low relief carving and sgraffito to add texture and visual interest to your vase, bringing your design to life with decorative details.
Activity: Finalise your vase by applying low relief and sgraffito decorations, making sure the piece is ready for firing.
Knowledge required
No prior ceramics knowledge is required - this course is perfect for beginners. If you have some experience, our tutor will encourage you to build on your skills.
What you'll get
Attendees will get one bag of clay and use of state-of-the-art Shimpo equipment. Attendees will get to take home 2 large beautiful handmade ceramic items they have made themselves and several smaller pieces. All tools, materials, and firing are included ($10 per kilo for any extra work over the 4-piece maximum).
You will gain skills and knowledge in areas of hand-building and decorating.
When your work is ready for collection, you will receive email notification (approximately 4 to 6 weeks after the course completion date).
What to bring
Work clothes that they don't mind getting a little dirty, closed-toe shoes, trimmed nails, and a towel.
Session repeats
This class series runs over 6 consecutive sessions, at the same time every week.