Posts Categorized: News

For Paul, Who Dared Me!

Here are a few photos from our 5 mile walk up to Parson’s Folly or ‘the tower’ at the top of Bredon Hill. It Is customary to take a walk after Sunday lunch and in spite of the misty rain and the fresh breeze at the top, we forged on. We are looking west towards… Read more »

Back From Uganda!

The Milways, not me. Since my Stratford post the days have been accelerating. Getting their house in order, shopping for a year’s supply of tea, finishing up a few pots, walking around the hill, dinner parties with Ann and Steve Marchant and lunching in the pub with Ron and Lorna Wheeler. Ron wrote the wonderful… Read more »

My First Love…

…in the arts was theater and last night I treated myself to a production of The Winter’s Tale at Stratford-on-Avon. It is one of Shakespeare’s lesser plays for me as the tone is very strange. Dark and brooding in the first half and as light as a comedy after intermission.I have my Jesuit education to… Read more »

Art in Action Scenes

One of the best art events I’ve ever visited is held near Oxford each summer. Called Art in Action it is a true art extravaganza with something like 150 artists and craftspeople exhibiting…and demonstrating as well as a hundreds of hands on classes, music, great food and a marketplace for more sales of fine art… Read more »

94 Year Old Potter!!!

Ray Finch has been inspiring me for more than 30 years and he’s still doing so. I finally got over to Winchcombe yesterday and there was the old boy, making vases and cider jars with more clay than he’s tackled in some time. The warm weather helps the feeling in his fingers (the winter is… Read more »

Bredon Hill

Conderton is one of the villages sometimes referred to as a ‘string of pearls’ that encircle Bredon Hill. The hill rises to almost 1,000ft. and stands apart from the Cotswold range to the east, although it’s geology is certainly related, and the Malvern Hills to the west. It has several ‘standing stones’ and Bronze Age… Read more »

La Bastille

Today is officially Bastille Day, France’s version of our Independence Day. I was fortunate to be invited on Sunday to Marthe and James Gardner’s for ‘a L’aperitif et ‘a Dejeuner at their elegant home, The Old Vicarage, in the nearby village of Beckford. The afternoon began with champagne on the lawn and then was followed… Read more »

Food Glorious (English!) Food

Broad BeansGooseberriesLoganberriesStrawberriesRaspberriesFlapjacks (for Paul!)Stilton cheeseElderflower cordialCauliflower cheeseBrussel sproutsLeeks ScrumpieReal AleTeaDigestive biscuitsCakeGin and tonicGranary breadGreengages

Good Beer, Better Company

Last evening I met blogger Matt and his lovely lady, Tig, at The Royal Oak pub in Gretton. When I worked at Winchcombe in the late ’70’s it was our ‘local’, being just up the hill from the pottery. There was a closer pub, but in those days it wasn’t a ‘Freehouse’ and therefore they… Read more »

Cricket

Today starts the first of 5 Test Matches between England and Australia. Altogether they make up what is called “The Ashes” and it is the most highly anticipated contest in the Cricket world. It is a marathon test of endurance for both players and fans, lasting up to 5 days for each match and altogether… Read more »

Breakfast with Parry

All is quiet in the village now as the Milways departed at 3AM this morning for deepest, darkest Africa (Uganda, to be specific) and I am now King of the Castle, Lord of the Manor and Keeper of the Dreaded Parrot! Parry is a very talented African Grey who long ago decided that we were… Read more »

Home Away from Home

Here are a few photos of Toff and Georgie Milway’s home and pottery in the beautiful Cotswold stone village of Conderton. I’ll show more of the magnificent gardens at another time.Sometimes I pretend that this is my English country home and that the Milways are my caretakers. Georgie always gives me the evil eye when… Read more »

More News from England; week #2

The Milway’s are off to Tewkesbury to get their final shots before departing for Uganda (lot’s of malaria in that part of the world and plenty of other strange infectious beasties!), so I have a rare quiet moment to myself. After our exhibition here last week we put the pottery back together, moved the sheep… Read more »

Beware of Bloggers Bearing Gifts!

It’s seems odd not to be including photos, but I’ve yet to figure it out from here (here being England) . I arrived safely and all has been frantic and wonderful as we prepared for the ‘Open Weekend’. All went very well and lots of pots were sold, but the highlight was seeing Doug and… Read more »

Travelling Shoes

Beth is coming to pick me up in 33 minutes for the drive to Dulles Airport. By 9pm US time tomorrow I’ll be back in the bosom of the Cotswolds in the shadow of Breedin Hill with the Milways. That’s Gloucestershire England for those of you not in the know, where I bumped into the… Read more »

A Well-Soaked Kiln

I began loading the kiln early last week. Almost every day was marked by torrential rain with more than 12″ in 10 days time! One day we had 5″ in 24 hours. Much of it was accompanied by lightening and thunder storms and on two occasions hail. It made for a disconcerting week. Sometimes the… Read more »

Lucky # 7

I decided to put off firing for a day after the week of rain we had…everything is damp and moldy. I put the wicket up yesterday (that’s the door for you Yanks) and cleaned up the site. 4am tomorrow I’ll be lighting up. It’s going to be warmer out than I’d prefer (85 degrees). I’m… Read more »

Monday through Friday

With firing # 7 coming up on Monday, I’ve been trying to keep my focus on loading and all the bits and pieces that come with this step in the process. But the rain has been torrential…biblical…relentless… and disconcerting. We’ve had something like 8″ of rain or more…day after day. Midweek we had crazy rain… Read more »

Where Clay Comes From…

I spent a good chunk of time today roadtripping down to Richmond. I delivered pots to be shipped to England for the show I’m doing with Toff in a few weeks and then wandered back to the studio via some lovely country routes. I stopped at a couple of antique Emporiums and actually bought a… Read more »

The Big Event

Friday evening we hosted a fundraising event at Libertytown that turned out to be a great financial success as well as a whole lot of fun. We called this evening ‘The Big Event’ because it concluded something that we started a month ago.Here’s the idea, which came from the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria,… Read more »

Peanuts

I never get tired of folks who enjoy my work. Karen Johnson visited from California with a local friend and she swept into Libertytown Friday afternoon, full of enthusiasm and compliments. I’d never met her before, but she is a fine ceramic artist in her own right and somehow she has remembered my work from… Read more »

Martin Bros. Homage

Here’s what became of the recent coin banks. This could be the start of a blogging revolution. Perhaps AKAR will one day have a sale like their Yunomi show…think of it, hundreds of people saving money by buying our handmade pots!The banks were fun, but this next piece has me close to giddy. I have… Read more »

My Generator

I was asked a while ago about the equipment I use at my studio since I don’t have electricity. This is my super quiet Honda generator. Pricey, but worth every penny. I also bought myself a Shimpo Whisper Wheel. It is half the horsepower of my ancient Brent CXC and much quieter, but will still… Read more »

Production

Sunday was the last day I could spend on the wheel and I decided I’d finish up with one last batch of mugs and coin banks. I ran out of steam at 75 pots! I used to throw like this all the time. Simple pots made quickly…the Winchcombe way. I’ll spend a couple of days… Read more »

A Week to Go

I only left myself two weeks to make pots for the wood chamber and the clock is ticking ever faster. I plan to fire then sort and ship and then it’s off to merry ol’ England for 7 weeks! (life is tough!). I’ve been revisiting some of my ‘production potter’ chops to make a lot… Read more »