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Guest JBaymore

 I do think that the insides of this form fire a little cooler than an open form but you can compensate for that by placing them in a hotter firing part of the kiln.

 

Thermal lag.  A soak or firing more slowly to cone fixes this best.

 

best,

 

...............john

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 I do think that the insides of this form fire a little cooler than an open form but you can compensate for that by placing them in a hotter firing part of the kiln.

 

Thermal lag.  A soak or firing more slowly to cone fixes this best.

 

best,

 

...............john

 

 

Yup, I do fire slowly towards the end of the firing and soak but I still put them in the hot part of the kiln.

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Grinding shelves today .....

 

 

and planning to make more of these salt hogs (these are my first ever, they are nice and easy to make) 

 

When I saw "salt hogs" I thought it was a replica of one of those NPC's on Startopia.     Googled "salt hogs" and sure enough, Startopia came up first.  Looked down the listings and found some of the containers.  I had no idea such a piece to hold salt existed.   Very interesting pieces.   Do you have to inform people of their use?  (or am I in the minority of not recognizing them?)

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We are planning on a four day firing (heating cycle) as "typical" at this point.  Then at least a week to cool.  While not huge, ....... it still is a large kiln.

 

best,

 

....................john

Should you ever need help filling it and stoking it, well I am just up the road a piece...

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Guest JBaymore

 

We are planning on a four day firing (heating cycle) as "typical" at this point. Then at least a week to cool. While not huge, ....... it still is a large kiln.

 

best,

 

....................john

Should you ever need help filling it and stoking it, well I am just up the road a piece...

 

 

Eventually there will be more "open" community firings of some sort via the Community Education (Continuing Ed. ..... Adult Ed.) division of the NH Institute of Art. First off, it is being built and fired a few times mainly by BFA/MFA program folks and the faculty. We need to "learn" the kiln a bit. Every one is a tad different to fire.

 

best,

 

.........................john

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After seeing Pres's Beautiful wedding jars and Rebel Rockers amazing work, I am NOT going to post pics of the shot glasses I have been working on.  Making, not emptying.  But also I helped put together a Pop Up Art Gallery for our little burg and it was very successful and so much fun.  Yep, should have been throwing pots, but this was just great art exposure for our community!

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Last week was making ikebana vases for an upcoming salt firing.  Hand-building.  At the beach.

Way cool, everybody is talking ikebana at the craft shows and farmer's markets lately!  I wonder, what do you do about the frogs???

 

For these type of ikebana, I use a dab of E6000 silicone adhesive to fix the kenzan/frog in the vase. These are "closed" forms with a hole in the top to put flowers, so you don't want the kenzan/frog moving around. I make several varieties/variations of ikebana vases; they are my top seller. I display them with live flowers, so customers can readily see how to use them.

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What do you mean, "What do you do about the frogs'?   I glue them in with E6000.

That's what I wondered so you buy them, I was mulling over ways to make them of ceramic but I didn't think it realistic.  Now I'm not thinking it realistic some more... They seem an expensive addition to a product but the people seem to desperately want ikibanas. 

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What make a vase an Ikebana vase?

Virtually any container can be used for ikebana. Shallow containers are called suiban and the kenzan/frog can be moved around from side to side, corner to corner -- they are not fixed. Typically, you try to match the size/shape/color/texture of the container to the floral materials. Ikebana is a formal arrangement of the flowers; some schools of ikebana are very traditional and follow strict rules in how branches are to be arranged, the length of branches, the angle in which the branches extend from the vase, etc. Other schools are more expressive -- although you should be able to find the three core angles/directions in them.

 

For the vases in my picture, it is not practical (depth of pot) to have the kenzan/frog moving around; so I glue them in -- and customers like that approach. I also sell tall cylinder vases for use in ikebana, with no kenzan/frog.

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What do you mean, "What do you do about the frogs'?   I glue them in with E6000.

That's what I wondered so you buy them, I was mulling over ways to make them of ceramic but I didn't think it realistic.  Now I'm not thinking it realistic some more... They seem an expensive addition to a product but the people seem to desperately want ikibanas.

 

If you go to Michaels or the other "big box" stores, a kenzan/frog is expensive. I buy mine in bulk I two sizes, 23mm and 32mm; they add about $1.80 to the cost of the vase -- $2.00 rounded up added to selling price. If I did not buy bulk, I could not make these at an affordable price. I have bought from a seller on E-bay and from www.ezpots.com.

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What do you mean, "What do you do about the frogs'?   I glue them in with E6000.

That's what I wondered so you buy them, I was mulling over ways to make them of ceramic but I didn't think it realistic.  Now I'm not thinking it realistic some more... They seem an expensive addition to a product but the people seem to desperately want ikibanas.

 

If you go to Michaels or the other "big box" stores, a kenzan/frog is expensive. I buy mine in bulk I two sizes, 23mm and 32mm; they add about $1.80 to the cost of the vase -- $2.00 rounded up added to selling price. If I did not buy bulk, I could not make these at an affordable price. I have bought from a seller on E-bay and from www.expots.com.

 

Brilliant. thank you for sharing this valuable advise :) 

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I finally gave in to pressure from a few orders and sat down at my wheel this week.  I threw a bunch of stuff but here is a few of the things drying for the bisque.  Now if I could just get motivated to do some glazing.  I have about 4 kiln loads of bisque ware sitting on the shelves waiting for the mood to hit.  I hate glazing.  

post-9888-0-59952300-1407379817_thumb.jpg

post-9888-0-59952300-1407379817_thumb.jpg

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I'm working on cups, yunomi tumblers,guinomi ( basically cylinders) ( still on my thousand cylinder quest) and occasional attempt at matcha chawan, currently struggling with lips.

I realize the lip (Kuchi zukuri)feel contributes greatly in creating that favorite mug, cup, glass,bowl. I do realize there are different lips, while I'm making adequate lips they are not spectacular. Ok I can make a thick neutral lip consistently, the rest are lucky breaks. I'm also working on thinner shoulders but that is much further leap into the future.

I'm also learning how to work all this into a woodfired aesthetic. I've settled into a few good clays, and one good glaze ( shino of course, American shino if you are being technical. I have a few pieces that are going on 6 month turnaround so progress here is slow.

I'm also concentrating on technique. Technique related and possibly secondary to form at this point in my practice.

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I am prepping for my first show in 6 years. It's on Friday, and is just a one night street market. Everything got glazed, and it's all pricing and hang tags and display time...

 

Thank you to everyone who has posted anything on business, display, production, tech stuff, and humour in the last 9 months or so!

I lurked a long time before becoming active, and every helpful answer to someone else helped me, too.

I am grateful.

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Dharsi, I like your mugs! That pear-ish shape looks like it would be really comfy to hold and use.

 

I'm a student / hobby potter, so at this point I'm mostly just playing around and trying out different forms to see what I like. I've been doing bowls altered on the wheel lately - split rim, faceted / scalloped rim, scalloped all the way down. I have a few medium-to-large bowls in progress like that. At least one is destined to become a yarn bowl for Mother Dear or one of her knitter friends. Also trying to make a decently matching set of dinner plate, salad plate, bowl, and mug, maybe a teapot or some serving dishes to match as well. I've also been having some fun with a teardrop-shaped closed form with a knob at the top - it can end up being a chopstick box, a birdhouse or bird feeder, a salt pig, a luminary, all kinds of stuff.

 

The piggy bank in my icon is one more thing I'm working on - I have two of them that have been bisque fired and are awaiting glaze. My favorite one lost two of his feet though, so we'll see if I can glaze him back together.  

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Guest JBaymore

post-1543-0-70509200-1407465785_thumb.jpg

 

The anagama site is coming along from the last picture I posted earlier in this thread.  Today we unloaded about 1/2 of the refractories off an 18 wheeler in a torrential downpour (that started when the truck arrived... and which stopped when it left, of course).

 

Starting this Sunday morining... this project....teaching this class...... will occupy 110% of my time for 14 straight days. Then I have one day to rest... and the fall semester starts!!!

 

best,

 

................john

post-1543-0-70509200-1407465785_thumb.jpg

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