Handbuilding Workshop For Ages 10-18 and Wheel-Throwing Workshop for Experienced Potters, Both Starting Wednesday, July 10!
If you or a young person you know is looking to beat the heat next week, then we have two workshops starting on Wednesday, July 10, that might just be for you! The first is a coil plant pot workshop for young people age 10–18! It is co-taught and co-hosted by Staunton Clayground and Art Hive, with the collaboration of artist and master gardener Jacques of Mottainai. The second is a surface decoration workshop for wheel throwers with Nicole Eyerman Hill. Sign-ups close on Monday, July 8, at 5pm, so claim your spot while you can!
Hello, Friends of the Staunton Clayground!
We hope that you all had a fantastic July 4!
Here at the Staunton Clayground we have been super busy getting everything ready for our Studio Membership Program launch, which is happening this week! We’ve been gearing up for this since the day we opened, and it’s hard to believe it’s finally here. We’ve had a great response and are very excited to welcome our first official members into the studio tomorrow morning!
Amidst all of that excitement, we’ve also been hard at work trying to make sure there is a great selection of classes and workshops for you all to enjoy throughout this long hot summer. After all, on these hot, hot days, where better to be than in a cool pottery studio with your hands in wet clay?
If you or a young person you know is looking to beat the heat next week, then we have two workshops starting on Wednesday, July 10, that might just be for you!
Come clay! Cut off for sign-ups is Monday, July 8 at 5 p.m., so claim your spot!
The first is a coil plant pot workshop for young people age 10–18! It is co-taught and co-hosted by Staunton Clayground and Art Hive, with the collaboration of artist and master gardener Jacques of Mottainai and is our first (we hope of many) such collaboration within our area’s great arts and creative community. Attendees will make and decorate clay coil pots inspired by indigenous artists, and then learn how to use them to plant and care for a plant of their own. Read more details and get your tickets through Art Hive at this link and don’t miss out on this hands-on experience where art meets nature!
The second, Vases & Carving, is a workshop for slightly more experienced wheel throwers. If you can throw a simple 4-inch cylinder on your own, then this workshop is for you! Nicole Eyerman Hill will walk you through the process of crafting wheel-thrown vases meant to be carved and faceted to create unique surface decoration.
Sign-ups for both of these will be closing on Monday, July 8, at 5:00 p.m., so don’t miss your chance to come and join in the fun!
Looking for a different sort of handbuilding experience? Then look no farther than two more workshops, both for ages 14 and up, starting on July 16 and August 9, both are taught by a special guest instructor, local artist Janly Jaggard.
Special handbuilding workshops by local artist Janly Jaggard, right here at Staunton Clayground, this summer!
Still not quite what you’re looking for? Well, stay tuned, because we are getting ready to post 😃 three new pottery-wheel classes with two new teachers 😃, all starting over the next few weeks, two for all-level beginners and one for intermediate wheel throwers. Stay tuned, because we’ll be getting you all of the details, right here, over the next few days!
Stay cool, stay safe, and keep watching this space!
Three New Handbuilding Workshops in July and August! Two With Local Artist Janly Jaggard and One In Partnership With The Art Hive!
We have had quite a few queries about whether we were going to have new handbuilding workshops this summer, and we are very excited to officially announce three! Two, a Sculptural Coiled Forms workshop starting July 16 and an intensive Clay Slabbing and Hollow Forms workshop beginning August 9 (both geared towards adults age 14+), are taught by special guest artist and instructor Janly Jaggard. The third, for young people ages 10–18, entitled coil pot planters | 3 day clay workshop, is a “co-production” by Staunton Clayground, the Art Hive and Mottainai! Read on to learn more about all of them!
We have had quite a few queries about whether we were going to have new handbuilding workshops this summer, and we are very excited to officially announce three! Two, a Sculptural Coiled Forms workshop starting July 16 and an intensive Clay Slabbing and Hollow Forms workshop beginning August 9 (both geared towards adults age 14+), are taught by special guest artist and instructor Janly Jaggard. The third, for young people ages 10–18, entitled coil pot planters | 3 day clay workshop, is a “co-production” by Staunton Clayground, the Art Hive and Mottainai! Click the links or read on to learn more about all of them!
Let’s start with that last one, “coil pot planters | 3 day clay workshop,” because it is starting first (Wednesdays, July 10, 17, 24, from 1:00–4:00 pm)! Designed for young people ages 10–18, it is set to take place at Staunton Claygroundand the Art Hive.
During the first day, taking place in our clay studio, “Get inspired by indigenous potters Maria Martinez & Louise Goodman as you dive into the art of coil pot construction. We'll share stories and techniques while you build your very own coil pot, ready to house your favorite plant.” The last two sessions will be hosted at the Art Hive. During these two, students will first decorate their pots using underglaze painting then, to wrap up the workshop, “Join Jacque from Mottainai for a fun session on planting and caring for your new green buds in your beautiful vessel!
Don't miss out on this hands-on experience where art meets nature!” Tickets available here!
Our next two new handbuilding workshops, both for adults, are taught entirely at the Staunton Clayground by a special guest instructor, local artist Janly Jaggard. Here’s a link to her bio on our website, and you can check out her art on her own website here!
The first will be a Sculptural Coiled Forms workshop, taking place over five 3-hour sessions, 1:00–4:00 p.m. on Tuesdays and Fridays, July 16, 19, 23, 26 and August 6, 2024.
“It will deal with several aspects of working with earthenware clay and has both the beginner and the experienced clay worker in mind. The focus will be on material and on the design skills that will build aesthetic discernment about handbuilding skills as well as shape, form, surface and texture. Students will begin with drawings or other found references, like images that are of plant and other natural forms such as seaweed, trees, sand dunes, clouds, leaves, legs, etc., which will be the starting point for shape and form and then detail of texture and color.”
The second is an intensive workshop, Clay Slabbing and Hollow Forms, consisting of two 6-hour sessions + glazing day: 10:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m. on Sat. and Sun., August 9 and 10, and glazing Fri., Aug. 30, 10:00 a.m. until finished (may take less time than the previous two sessions).
As Janly Jaggard writes, “Slabbing is a technique that uses leather-hard clay construction and recalls real-world angular shapes. These shapes are the inspiration for the project students will create in this workshop. Ideas will come from references to buildings, man-made forms such as machines, and manufactured forms. We will make plans and drawings on paper then work on rolling out clay. Exploration of methods of joining slabs and developing surface decoration will be next, as the clay gets to leather hard and ready for building. Decoration and embellishment includes adding clay, piercing, carving, and using color.”
If, on the other hand, it is wheel classes you’re looking for, more experienced wheel throwers ages 14+ can join Nicole Eyerman Hill for her 3-day Wheel Throwing & Surface Decoration workshop, Vases & Carving, in which students will focus on throwing small vases with slightly thicker than usual walls, making it possible to carve out faceting or other designs once the vessels are leather-hard.
This is an interesting way to add interest to the surface of any piece, and can be done either on plain clay as a way to show off the effects of particular glazes or in combination with colored slip or underglaze decoration applied before clear-glazing.
We hope to add at least one more beginner wheel class over the summer, so stay tuned!
Meanwhile, thank you to everyone who has applied for our Studio Membership program! You can expect to hear from us very soon 😃 We’re working through those applications right now!
See you soon at the Staunton Clayground!
A Great Weekend at the Staunton Clayground… With Our First Handbuilding Workshop and Garden Stake Pick-Up!
The studio was a hive of activity as we kicked off our first weekend workshop, Slab Geometric Vases, taught by Nicole Hill of @eyerman.art, and welcomed visitors for our second Open Door day on Sunday afternoon. It was also a chance for attendees of our original April Open House to pick up their completed garden stakes, an activity we definitely intend to repeat, since everyone had such a good time painting them.
Visit the post for shots from the Saturday and Sunday sessions of the workshop!
What a great weekend we had at Staunton Clayground.
The studio was a hive of activity as we kicked off our first weekend workshop, Slab Geometric Vases, taught by Nicole Hill of @eyerman.art, and welcomed visitors for our second Open Door day on Sunday afternoon. It was also a chance for attendees of our original April Open House to pick up their completed garden stakes, an activity we definitely intend to repeat, since everyone had such a good time painting them.
Here are some shots from the Saturday and Sunday sessions of the workshop!
Day 1: Students pick out the vase they want to make, choosing from 4 sets of stencils. They then roll out slabs of clay, add textural designs to their surfaces and use the stencils to cut out the shapes they’ll need to assemble their pieces. These sit overnight, pressed so they won’t warp, to firm up enough to work with.
Day 2: Students assemble their slabs into the final shapes of their vases using clay coils, slip (that’s very watery clay, that works kind of like glue here), tools and…. very muddy fingers (we weren’t kidding about the whole playground-clayground thing)!
Wrapping up our second day, the final slab pieces go into place, the edges get cleaned up, then the vases get wrapped to dry slowly for a few days before they go into the kiln for their first firing. After that, they’ll be ready to glaze!
Stay tuned for photos of glazing day and of the finished products in June!
Meanwhile, if this looks like good fun to you, there are still spots in our next slab building workshop, coming up next week: Sculptural Slab Creations, taught by our very own Cary, where you can try your hand at making purely decorative or highly functional pieces over the course of three mornings (Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday) + one morning in early June for glazing!
An example of some of the types of things you can make in our upcoming Sculptural Slab Creations workshop!
Come and clay!
Last Evening Handbuilding In “Intro To Clay”
Students and teachers had fun working on slab-built boxes and putting some final touches on previous coil and hand-sculpting projects, wrapping up the first half of this spring's "Intro to Clay" class. This concludes are whistle-stop tour of some basic handbuilding techniques. Starting next week, it’s on to the pottery wheel!
Yesterday evening we all (teachers included!) had a great time putting some finishing touches on all of the handbuilding projects we’ve been working on since our “Intro to Clay” class started two weeks ago. Here are some highlights from last night’s class! Rest up, kids, because next week we move on and take a spin on the pottery wheel. Can’t wait!
Just a few highlights from our class, where we worked on wrapping up some handbuilding projects, including plates made using hand-rolled slabs, textured boxes cut from slabs we learned to make on the slab rolling machine, some coil-built bowls and hand-sculpted animals. Thank you to @octobergracemedia for the amazing photos!
Stay tuned next week for pics from our first wheel-throwing class on Monday! And if you missed the earlier post about this “Intro to Clay” class, you can check it out here.
Plenty Of Fun In Our First "Introduction To Clay" Class… And More Workshops Starting Soon!
The Staunton Clayground “Introduction to Clay” class delves into using the pinch-pot technique to make animal figurines in their third session. Everybody’s been having fun learning basic handbuilding skills, and they’ll be starting on wheel-throwing next week. More workshops and classes are starting in May, with spots still available. It’s claytime!
Hello everybody! It’s been a busy last several days at the Staunton Clayground since our Open House.
Feathered friend in the works (photo by @octobergracemedia)
On Monday, just two days our Open House, we kicked off our very first “Introduction to Clay” class. This is a 5-week course covering basic pottery techniques, and the first half of it, taught by Cary, covers basic handbuilding techniques.
A bird begins to take form (photo by @octobergracemedia)
So far, we’ve had an intro to hand-rolled slab building and coil building, as well as learning the fundamentals of using a slab rolling machine, but yesterday evening, during the third class, everyone had a lot of fun getting into kid mode and using simple pinch-pot skills to make animal figurines.
Fancy about to take flight! (photo by @octobergracemedia)
The odd whale out!
We’ll be continuing work on these later this week, as well as moving along with our other projects. We’ll have more fun photos for you soon!
(photo by @octobergracemedia)
Meanwhile, if the idea of handbuilding tickles your fancy, we’ve got a couple of fun workshops starting in May, and still have a few spots available in each! Check them out on our Classes, Course & Workshops page.
Spots still available!
In addition to prepping to teach the second, wheel-throwing portion of the Introduction to Clay course, Jennifer has also been busily waxing and glazing everyone’s garden stakes, which will be fired very soon! As soon as we know when they’ll be out of the kiln, we’ll plan an “Open Door” day for you to come and pick them up (or just to come and visit and tour the studio, if you didn’t have a chance to make it to the Open House).
Stay tuned for news!
Open House Tomorrow From 12–5 PM! Plus, we still have spots available in our Intro to Clay class, starting Monday evening!
Come celebrate the opening of the Staunton Clayground pottery studio at our Open House! There will be a chance to win a door prize of one pottery class or workshop, tour our studio, see live wheel throwing demos, enjoy refreshments by Pizzeria Luca and Magdalena Bake, and, in honor of Earth Day, paint your own ceramic garden stake. Plus, there are still spots available in our first class, starting Monday! Let’s clay!
That’s right! It is finally time for our Open House! We are officially opening our doors for business, and we can’t wait to share what we’ve been working on with you!
Come celebrate the opening of the Staunton Clayground pottery studio at our Open House tomorrow from 12–5 pm! There will be a chance to win a door prize of one pottery class or workshop, tour our studio, see live wheel throwing demos, enjoy refreshments by Pizzeria Luca and Magdalena Bake, and, in honor of Earth Day, paint your own ceramic garden stake (we’ll fire it for you for pick-up later).
Still wondering how to find us? We are located in “The Cellar” at 123 W. Frederick St., with our main entrance around the back of the post office building. Free parking spots for “The Cellar” are available in the lot at 116 N. Lewis St. There is also plenty of on-street parking nearby, and we are just a few blocks’ walk from the public parking lots (also free on weekends) at the Wharf and on South New St.
In other exciting news, our first class, “Introduction to Clay,” co-taught by Cary and Jennifer, is kicking off next week, on Monday evening, to be precise!
An Introduction to Clay: Basics of Wheel and Handbuilding will consist of nine 2-hour sessions (18 hours total): Monday and Thursday evenings, from 6:00 – 8:00, (April 22, 2024 – May 20, 2024)
“Come and learn the basics of working with clay! If you are an absolute beginner or haven’t been back to the pottery studio since that class you took in school, then this course is for you. The goal of this pottery class is to learn the basics of functional pottery and have several pieces to show for it by the time the course has concluded. Over nine 2-hour sessions, students will experiment with hand building using slabs and molds and with using the wheel to make basic pottery shapes such as small cups, bowls and mugs.
Everything we make will be functional and oven, microwave, dishwasher and food safe!”
We’ve got a whole bunch of other classes lined up, too, with more coming soon. Please don’t forget to visit our online shop or our Classes, Courses & Workshops page and check them out!
We hope you can come and see us! We are more than ready to finally invite you to “Come and clay!”
See you soon!
Our Class Line-Up Is Here And Our Online Shop Is Open For Business!
Here at the Staunton Clayground we are unveiling our initial line-up of classes for Spring–Summer 2024 and our online store is open for business, so you can claim your spot. We can’t wait for you to come and clay!
Today is a very big day for us, because we are finally unveiling our initial class line-up and opening our online store for business! Read on to learn more!
More in-depth info about all of these classes and workshops described below is available on the Classes, Courses & Workshops page of our website, and our shop is now open, so head on over if you are ready to claim your spot! You can also see how all of these things fit together on our brand new Upcoming Classes & Events Calendar page.
We’ll be kicking things off in April with An Introduction to Clay, where participants will learn the basics of both handbuilding and wheel throwing, the two main forms of pottery creation. This evening class, starting the Monday after our Open House (taking place on April 20!), will consist of nine two-hour sessions and it will be co-taught by Cary and Jennifer.
Next up, in May, we will have a six-hour handbuilding workshop, Slab Geometric Vases, taking place over the course of three days. For this one we are very pleased to introduce a new addition to our team, fantastic local potter Nicole Eyerman Hill (you might know her from her booth at Staunton’s Art in the Park, 2023 edition). You can learn more about her on our Staff & Instructors page!
This will be joined on our calendar by a twelve-hour handbuilding workshopstarting the week after Memorial Day, this one entitled Sculptural Slab Creations. Our very own Cary Dahl will be leading this exploration of the basics and possibilities of slab building to help you develop and complete projects that can be either functional or ornamental. Your imagination is the limit!
Nicole returns in early June to teach an eighteen-hour Intermediate Wheel Throwing class on Wednesday evenings over the course of six weeks.
Not feeling quite ready for intermediate wheel? Our Studio Manager, Jennifer, will be leading eighteen-hour Pottery Wheel for All-Level Beginners courses twice over the course of the summer.
Remember, you can read more about all of these on the Classes, Courses & Workshops page of our website!
(All of these classes and workshops are designed for adults (age 14+). We are definitely planning to include workshops for younger people and children going forward, but including those in our initial line-up has proven to be a bit more than we could organize to start. Bear with us! Over the coming months we plan to expand our offerings to include plenty of things for kids as well.)
Meanwhile, we are hoping to add more workshops and classes before the summer is out, so keep watching this space!
Let’s clay!! 😀
Staunton Clayground postcards are popping up around town!
Excited to share the first promotional postcard from the Staunton Clayground, featuring a background of flowers from one of our founder’s own handbuilt vases and our official logo!
Our wonderful founder, Cary Dahl, had these lovely postcards made to share the news about our soon-to-open Studio! You may have already seen them around Downtown Staunton, but just in case you haven’t… I couldn’t let you miss them! Thank you so much to all of the businesses who have offered their counter-top, shop-window and bulletin-board space to help us spread the word.
Our first promotional postcard, featuring flowers from our of our founder Cary’s own handbuilt vases.
The flower decoration in the background is actually a detail from one of Cary’s own handbuilt vases. See if you can pick it out from the crowd in the gallery you’ll find if you scroll towards the bottom of our homepage!
One of the first classes we plan to feature will be a handbuilding class taught by Cary, so check out our Classes & Courses page for more info if you’re interested! Dates coming soon :-) You can also read more about Cary on our Staff & Instructors page.
By the time our next batch of cards is ready for circulation, we will be able to grace them with an Open House date.
Keep watching this space!
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