Human fingers made this pot - isn't that wondrous?
Primary school - South Wales – the 1950’s; every Friday afternoon was ‘clay time’ and since then, from the age of five years old, I have loved to get my hands into some of that gloriously squidgy stuff. Nowadays it's only self-hardening clay that I play with, but I'm passionate about the arts of ceramics, bringing forth beautiful and useful constructions from the very materials of the good earth, whether as in a high art form, or as artisan creations for the house and garden (and even as I say that I dispute that artisan creations are separated from other beautiful forms of art) .
I love interesting ceramics for use at the table and in the kitchen, but you won't be surprised to know that one of my favourite (and most expensive!) interests is to purchase items for the garden, and in the garden, I say that terracotta is Queen. The richness of the colour, the sensuous, gritty texture of the different types of clay from which pots are made, and the sheer practicality of the use for growing plants. Everything seems to do much better in a terracotta pot and cuttings positively storm away ! All are reasons for hunting down good terracotta pots and for good terracotta pots, in fact utterly beautiful pots, totally irresistible pots, I make a biannual pilgrimage to Whichford pottery in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds (a part of the country of great beauty and a joy to travel through).
And so it was that we found ourselves today on pilgrimage 😊
Look - rather than give you verbal descriptions - why not just gloat over the gorgeousness of these receptacles?
Pots great...
...and small
For ornament......and for practical use
Of course we came home with some small purchases; I was taken with some small pans for growing succulents and a bargain “Shakespeare series” pot with a quote from Hamlet pressed into the side (reduced merely because of a minor flaw in the script – clearly not good enough for the high standards of the pottery, but quite good enough for me!), while Alec thought that a beautiful ‘Pancheon’ pot with pie-crust ornamentation would look good back at Autumn Cottage – and I very much did not disagree!!
The extra delight in a visit to Whichford is to see not only pots of every shape, size and description, (and in ‘normal times’ to watch them being made as well), but to be inspired by the very creative plantings - walk through an archway from the stockyard to the courtyard and you could be sitting in a Mediterranean village rather than in the middle of the English countryside.
Having become completely over-excited with the pleasure of pots – we needed s Nice Sit Down – which we happily found at ‘The Norman Knight’ – the pub on the village green. There we indulged in a rather good pub lunch – Moules Mariniere for Alec - Asparagus and Artichoke Risotto for me
Once again, doing the things that In Other Days we would have taken a little bit for granted were now sprinkled with the gold-dust of newly underscored appreciation.
More on our Pilgrimage tomorrow - but for tonight ....
Journal prompt – do you work with and/or appreciate natural materials? Are you a craftsperson/artist, utilising clay? Stone? Cotton? Wool? wood? Where do you find your materials? What does it mean to you to handle the gifts of the earth in this way? How do you utilise or display the results?
What do you call yourself – artist? Craftsperson? What are your thoughts on this dichotomy? Are they two separate ‘states’ – or not? Lots of room for thoughts and musings here!
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