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Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Couple of mugs



 
Emptied the minute test kiln first thing this morning. First mug - underglazes very good - last one, too thin on the green underglaze on the foot. I've been concerned about applying these too heavily, but obviously needed to go a bit thicker than on this mug. It's not quite as pale as this photo shows, but definitely paler than I'd like it to be.

I love this mug and the simple design so I will make some more of these.

This apple green is nice and I'll play with it as a liner glaze. It's not quite the avocado, lime green I was looking for; but it is suitable for now.

The other slab tests of mixed underglazes did not give me anything exciting - mainly, just some nice, softer greens in this group. I'll have to make some fresh tiles today just for the black slips. I put them on a bisque tile over white slip which isn't giving me a true color. That will be one of today's jobs, as well as batching the darker yellow slip which I didn't get to yesterday. The grandkids came over for swimming and we all had a great time. Then it was time to harvest some basil and make pesto and salad for dinner, leaving the only studio time to firing the little test kiln and nothing more.

I'm running late this morning, so I need to quickly get my watering done, get a quick, cereal breakfast and into the studio for the day.








 

8 comments:

  1. I like the shape and proportion of the top one. Also liked the one your grand daughter chose a few posts ago.The cut foot gives them a little extra lift that looks great.

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  2. Thanks Dennis. The two you like are basically the same shape. It's a shape I used for my soda/salt fired spiral mugs. I'll be making some of those for these earthenware firings, using a teal glaze that all of this testing has brought forth.
    Oh, by the way - had to throw a ring of test tiles this morning and it's the first time I used the de-airing on my new Peter Pugger. Works like a dream!

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  3. I'm partial to the to exposed feet on the top two. In t.c. I seem to be drawn to exposed clay feet. The look comfortable to hold and drink from. Your white slip is giving you good coverage.

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  4. Can I ask you about your slip? When I do this type of work I always get slip drips...I dip my pots. Any suggestions? Your mugs look nice and neat. The drips don't bother me too much, but I am hearing customers comment on them.

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  5. I'm loving the look of the mugs. And normally I'm not a big an of blue - being more f a pinky green girl myself - but I LOVE the way that blue looks on the white.

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  6. Anna, make sure you slip is well sieved and not too thick. If I haven't mixed it in a while, I re-sieve it through a 100 mesh or smaller screen. I still get some drips; but let them dry and then use a scraper to smooth them out.
    It took me a while to get the slip consistency thick enough to cover and thin enough to not cause problem. I don't bother with specific gravity tests, I just mix, dip my hand in and when I lift my hand out, I want to the slip to cover my fingers, but let the lines on the knuckles show a bit as the slip falls off. That seems to be the perfect consistency for the slip I use.
    I bisque at Cone 04 and fire to Cone 04 in my digitally controlled Skutt kiln, with a 15 minute hold which makes a cone 3 bar cone in the sitter go down. Hope this helps.

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  7. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

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  8. Thanks for following up June. :) I fire cone 6...and I have no idea why I never considered scraping the drips down. I do get a lot of drip from the edge of the pot after dipping. Will work to be more diligent.

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