Kit

One of my favourite tools is a stone I picked up at the river. I've sanded it smoother so it's got for burnishing, and shaped it so one edge is sharper and a little pointed while the other side is rounded. It fits comfortably in my hand and I use it for pinch pots, smoothing clay into joins, burnishing and plenty of other bits and pieces.

Hallo all, it's been a while but I've done some more research and experimentation and have learnt a lot! I tried sanding pieces in the various stages of firing and found that (unsurprisingly), the harder the clay the better it is for sanding. Using the sand blaster works like a dream on bisque pieces and clears the surface very quickly. Unfortunately the machine is currently broken so I've got quite a few pieces waiting to be cleaned up, but there's no rush. I also meet a potter who makes large decorative pieces who fires them at a high temperature and then sands them with a fine grit. The pieces feel wonderfully smooth which compliments the complex designs nicely. Sanding like that would be more work for smaller pieces or more complex forms, but I definitely want to try that with the bigger ornamental pieces I have in mind. For the smaller pieces I'm very satisfied with the sand blaster and a thick glossy transparent glaze which fills in the rough parts nicely.

Thank you LeeU!

Thank you both! Ideally I would want the lines to be clean on both sides, it's such a shame to have the effect obscured, but it's a good point. And thanks for the tip Betty, I'll look in to it :-)

Hi Hulk, thanks so much! It's interesting that you sand everything but from what you describe it makes a lot of sense. I make most of my stuff at home so sanding isn't such an option, but I do regularly go to a workshop where I can do it. I hand build so trimming is minimal. I've found that if it scrape it when it's the wet enough I can get a really clean, smooth line, but that's a bit trickier on the insides of mugs and in corners. I'll report back once I've tried the sand blast box, if anything it'll be fun trying out a new gadget!

Hallo all, I've recently starting experimenting with mixing white and black clay and am building stock to hold my very market sale. While working on one design I've noticed that keeping the edges of the two colours clean is a bit tricky, as when you compress the clay before forming it the colours smudge ask over the place. Very cool for some things, but not for everything... I've explored scraping the clay while wet and leather hard, carving and sanding once bisque fired. So far the sanding gives the best effect, but it's so labour intensive and the pieces are so fragile there are blind to be a lot of breakages. I was thinking of sand blasting the pieces with baking soda, which I'm hoping to try soon. But does anyone have done advice on the best and quickest way of keeping the lines crisp and clean? I'd like to find the most efficient solution before I start making up over a hundred pieces!