february snow after the firing and an opportunity to photograph birds from the kitchen window

a dunnock fossicking about under the peanut feeder for crumbs

a great tit

and a marsh tit; there is a pair of these nearby and they love peanuts.

the coal tit is very similar but close-up you can see he has a wide black beard rather than the marsh tit’s little goatee.

and his black cap splits in half at the back of his head.

I left the kiln two days to cool after last August’s disaster when I opened too early and one big piece cracked. everything looks fine. cone 10 went right over; cone 11 just starting to go … perfect.

you can see the soot from the reduction; some people think I am over-reducing to get this smoke and black on the bricks, but it is during the early stages of reduction, between 1050 and 1150 C. then I cut down the strength of the reduction and I get these great oranges, greens and blues from my dolomite/tin oxide glaze.

the top centre piece has porcelain on the lower half, producing the grey blue, and the base clay is the “school” stoneware, a light buff – the blue glaze is almost black on this. next to it is my mixed basically st thomas body, with porcelain over it, and the copper version of the dolomite/tin glaze, with greens and oranges.

looking in, the top shelf at the back has worked really well.

close-ups of those smaller pieces.

no breakages – I put the black clay on sand now, a tip from Sarah Purvey, so that it can’t stick to the shelf and crack as it cools.

this porcelain piece on the left has the black version of the dolomite/tin glaze; interestingly the other two pieces I glazed with this have come out a dull matt freckled green .. maybe more – or less – reduction ….. will have to think about that.

the two black clay pieces. actually I mixed it half and half with a buff stoneware; glazed with the barium carbonate glaze it stays almost the same colour as it is after the bisque firing … you can see that the unglazed bit at the bottom of the left hand one is black though. a thinner coat of glaze will give a blacker result – next time … I have a few more of these waiting to be glazed.

the bottom of the back of the kiln looks great too – top and bottom has some good examples of the blue version of the dolomite/tin glaze.

the porcelain glaze which I expected to be black has gone matt khaki – that’s fine though,

close-up of those blues – quite intense.

and one pot photographed to look its best – then the camera’s batteries went in the cold. it’s only just above freezing.

january sunshine; the roof of the wood is a lattice of branches letting the blue sky in. the beech tree’s naked trunk twists and turns like a mature-bodied dryad, in the centre of its glade, floored with copper leaves

here the wood is thicker and still makes a dark shade contrasting its boundary with the open field.

the wood is dry and crackling with leaves underfoot. no signs of primrose or violet yet, although the woodpecker’s drumming rings through the trees on these sunny days and the great tit has begun his repetitive two tone song.

clumps of elm trees have died and collapsed; until the inevitable clones spring up from the roots the wood is opened up to daylight and brambles are spreading; there is less cover for the roe deer and I rarely see them. today a hare got up and ran out of the trees as we walked through, noisily cracking dead twigs and making our clumsy way, no doubt spreading alarm amongst the inhabitants.

in my garden the snowdrops are out, and the celandines. the first promise of life this year.

continuing to make pieces with plant impressions; this is clematis harvested from the tangle of dead stuff round the pillars of the verandah.

the first biscuit firing done, and now a glaze firing to prepare for the first day of february.

thistles have every hair outlined.

the sun was melting everything in its path

but in the shadows frosted leaves sparkled

and pattern gleamed softly

back in the shed I have added another layer to the porcelain, by washing china clay slip over it then sprinkling on china clay powder, and gently pressing it in with the rolling pin.

three tallish bottles to fill a space in the kiln

and another rectangular piece – there are a few of these now -

the impression of stems from the garden weakens and sometimes ruptures the pot wall, making interesting non-curved planes as the slab is bent around.

these crusty surfaces on darker clays work well with the saltmarsh and chalk beach glazes, but the white st thomas stoneware clay will make a difference, I need plenty of them so I can experiment.

so – continuing from the work I was doing with porcelain, I began by opening a bag of white St Thomas clay – a good almost-white stoneware – sprinkling my dust-to-large-bits-grog on it, impressing oak leaves and the hole-patterned piece of wood.

but recently I saw a beautiful and strange portrait of a woman wearing a high collar of ash twigs, by the Irish artist Alice Maher, and this has got me thinking of how to bring Nature into my work in a symbolic way. my garden is full of bare twigs at the moment; dogwood is looking particularly sculptural.

native dogwood; the twigs are a wonderful red colour.

I found an old bag of Southern Ice porcelain (from china clay mined in New Zealand) in just the right condition to be spread over the stoneware clay with a knife – a beautiful surface to impress into.

the twigs embed into it deeply and rupture the slab of clay as it is bent round to make the roughly cylindrical shapes. further bending for an oval base is impossible as the clay is still soft, and won’t support independent upright pieces. ( at this time of year there is not much dry in the air and I tend to work with the clay in a softer condition than in warmer weather).

some enthusiasm, and adaptation of working method to to the sticky and slightly floppy  material produced a flurry of new pieces.

softer shapes with more flow to them ..

and at the end, using up cut out pieces which were too small to make a curved wall pot produced a softly rectangular vessel.

this is not quite new; a long long time ago I was strictly rectangular, but this is much softer, and quite exciting. more to come!

the statue of the virgin is supposed to have been carved by St Luke, and remained buried in a field during the Moorish occupation of Spain. she is most miraculous, tiny, byzantine, carved in wood blackened with age, and dressed in the most outrageously rich outfit of gold and lace.

Ferdinand and Isabella donated large funds to the monastery which is richly carved and tiled, looming over the medieval town.

after the tour we had a very civilised lunch in the staid and comfortable hotel which belongs to the monastery. the dining room has a wonderful collection of locally made seventeenth century dishes and plates, decorated with green copper oxide painted onto tin glaze, hanging on the walls.

the deep greenery of the patio, a wonderful shady place to relax in in hot weather.

more tin-glazed ware hidden away in the hotel

the old Jewish quarter of the town retains the overhanging upper storeys, built of chestnut wood; some like this fully restored but many looking in need of complete renovation.

one can imagine how busy this fountain would have been before piped water came here, and not too long ago either.

from the steep streets you look out over wooded mountains. in Franco’s time many republicans on the run hid out in the sierras and ran rackets of various sorts, including kidnappings and ransomings; the Guardia  completely unable to do anything about them.

we left by the old military road to drive right over the top of the mountains

many blue ranges far across in the misty November light

turkey oaks still holding onto their leaves border the road; they are the scrub tree of the high places here.

heather and jarra,  gum cistus, smelling of incense, cover the slopes here almost at the summit.

views are terrific in every direction.

the road has been blasted out of the rocks, and would certainly have helped the army and the guardia to see what went on downhill.

sunshine picks out the chestnut groves in their autumnal glory

and the rounded peaks of these old mountains

on the western side the rock is all calcite, grey white, its strata stick up vertically in violent contrast, and scree slopes of broken rock sprawl away down the steep drops.

we wind our way down the plunging hairpins; here the road is surfaced with ridged concrete, it is much steeper this side.

we arrive at the height favourable to chestnut trees.

amongst pale grey rocks clad with moss and lichen these trees are managed and harvested.

rusty tawny bracken  flickers amongst the rocks like flames

a little lower the chestnuts still have all their leaves in vibrant yellow and orange. we drive through a village, past the open doors of the cooperativa de castañas, stuffed with sacks of chestnuts.

more spectacular scenery

what a backdrop for a spaghetti western ….

one more rock face, lit by the late sun … and we are back in the dehesa, rolling country of wood pasture, low pollarded holm and cork oak trees, sheep and cattle grazing amongst them.

not all leaves – here is one that has been attacked by the spaghetti spoon.

the remnants of the cut out ovals make shapes which demand to be attached as wings, or flanges.

today I worked with just the porcelain, rolling it out on a board contaminated with stoneware, iron bearing clays – this will give me some mottling and interesting variations under the glazes. I have a shaped piece of wood with a slot and holes in it, which works well as a repeated shape. a very small acorn still in its cup makes the round shapes, with more oak leaves as a border.

I am listening to the Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi, a hard sci-fi novel – which is almost an inspiration, with its convoluted plot and descriptions of strange spaceships and habitats, exo-memories and many other weird goings on.

constructing a sci-fi bottle …

there’s my ipod telling me stories on the bench …. a tall slim cylindrical bottle

and a one-winged vessel …..

the short afternoons limit my making, it starts to get dark after three, and I leave the rest of the porcelain wrapped for tomorrow.

the kiln is the one place they can’t use the jack trolleys and the huge pots, not yet fired and quite delicate, have to be manoeuvred by hand. also the kiln is lined with ceramic insulating fibre which is dangerous to breathe in, so masks are the order of the day.

the big dark jar on the right is one of four commissioned for a garden in Madrid – this will be spectacular!

they have started using manganese oxide to give an aged appearance, which I think works quite well. we also saw a large ridged jar treated with a white slip in their Caceres  shop which looked very impressive.

but the orange terracotta au naturel is very beautiful.

they have a collection of old pieces for sale in the storeroom. Jimenez was the potter in Arroyomolinas de Montanchez. this cono is as tall as me. “FABRICADE JUAN PEDRO JIMENEZ AÑO 1944″

In the local bodega where I bought wine they have this sort of thing, not used any more, but kept for interests sake.

I love this; the shape is gorgeous, and the surface bears all the marks of its making and its age.

old and new

this is a beauty too. I hope to buy some old pieces to keep in Spain.

they can keep my jar company.

double signature; the six-sided star, the star of David, is Moreno León’s stamp and indicates a very old origin .. possibly Catholic converts who stayed in Spain after the Jews were expelled.

back from Spain at the end of November and the Bale woods and fields have so much colour and life in them still it feels like a real homecoming.

the low sun’s warm yellowy light brings out the soft rosy oranges of old pantiled roofs.

the childish joy of kicking one’s feet through fallen leaves – and the joy of noticing every luminous medallion of a hazel leaf, every tan colour oak leaf, small and large, lobed shapes all different, all satisfying.

the beech tree still has leaves, in fact most trees still have some left

the hazels in the hedgerows a shower of gold

once most of the leaves are off the naked shapes of the hazels in the grove show up their natural tendency to coppice.

hawthorn berries in abundance and birds feeding on them. bullfinches’ soft piping and the occasional black and white rump vanishing into the hedge.

in Cake’s Lane a flock of redwing flip in and out of the hedges as I pass, and several blackbirds rattle their alarm calls.

the field maple have mostly shed their leaves but the sun’s glow ignites the stems and remaining leaves

and bracken stems shine with a brassy, rusty tinge.

holly and guelder rose with bright patterns of red berries; the birds are not hungry enough yet to have stripped them as the weather has been mild through November.

oaks hold onto their leaves longest, and some of the small trees in Cake’s Lane are at their best.

burnt sienna, yellow ochre, indian yellow, gamboge, brown madder, raw umber, green-gold, naples yellow, cadmium orange, venetian red, alazarin crimson, burnt umber, permanent sap green; leaves have colours as  beautiful as the old-fashioned names of artists watercolours.

early this morning the fields were all a little misty, as the sun came up through an opalescent mass of clouds low in the east. I took the camera out later, in the middle of the afternoon; low sun and damp air make the light soft and golden. a few plants have already reabsorbed most of their chlorophyll  pigment and are blazing colours out amongst the green.

a whitebeam already gone yellowy orange hangs over the stubble field

the cloud of pigeons took off as we appeared from under the trees. I love this field. it reflects light when it has a pale crop like barley, and this is the bleached remnant, the stubble.

what elegant curves and delicate colours – just a sycamore leaf in the road.

this hazel has already lost its leaves, maybe it has a problem

not a native tree this, a turkey oak , its strong colours and shapes glowing in the sunshine.

and more hog weed  – it’s still going strong. we have had a mild october; my japonica, a spring flowering shrub, has started flowering again.

elder does some interesting colour changes at this time of year; some of the leaves and stems lose almost all their colour, and some turn this dark red.

the winter wheat has been growing like mad; looking north across to Clip Street Farm.

dangly bunches of hornbeam seeds

bright in the sunshine

the holly trees are packed with berries; the birds will start the winter fat, at least.

beautiful colours on wild cherry suckers

and field maple – some are bright yellow, but these leaves look like becoming completely red soon.

a dog rose stem with almost fluorescent pink thorns

soft afternoon sunlight across the lane

and the last of the red admirals sunning himself. I have seen more of these butterflies this year than I remember for a long time.

parisian market stalls sell beautiful fruit. mangoes are my breakfast treat when I am there.

pollen from my flowers on this lovely crackled platter.

Philippe is collecting my pots. one is in  a photo in his book about using colour in interiors “Les Couleurs” – as is this mantelpiece.

this metallic knit hat is an old favourite, and blends in very well with the aged mirror, the faux shabby subtle stripes and the hat head (which is polystyrene with papier-maché and paint layered on). the pillbox hat is Philippe’s favourite (he is a hat designer amongst many other things).

here we are. next door there were three designers sharing a room. Kyoko is a japanese bag designer from London, and Aki makes plastic, very modern, jewellery. Hut Up is a felt designer from Berlin, Christine Birkle. you can see her website here. we will probably share this huge space next season. I only had it through enormous luck – the previous occupant cancelled, and the room could not be booked to anyone else in time, so Philippe suggested I took it instead of my tiny attic room. what a blessing! I would have suffered terribly from the heat in that tiny low-ceilinged south facing room. this room has two huge windows facing east into the courtyard, breezy, high ceilinged, and hardly any sunshine coming in. one of the coolest rooms in the house, I think. I didn’t need to use the lights until the last day, which helped to keep the temperature down.

it has panelling painted in whatever colours monsieur Philippe is experimenting with currently.

I was worried that my small collection would look a bit thin in such a large space, but it seemed to work. everybody was very complimentary, and I did a lot better than for the last few spring seasons. this is partly an ongoing trend anyway, but I am sure it would have been very difficult to take any orders in temperatures of thirty five plus.

I brought this beautiful patchwork blanket assembled by my assistant Sue Harper with infinite care and patience from old swatches, mostly cashmere. normally it is on my bed, but I thought it would help to dress the space.

pigeon pie came along. the panels are treated with some mysterious effect using chalk so the deep pink  in this part of the room is permanent.

in the kitchen the northern light is cool and translucent. the windows in this house which is used for photographing interiors so much are never cleaned. the dust forms an opaque screen so that the view is always obscured.

a funny little teapot arrangement in this eclectic room, which is our common room as well as the hub of the house. hospitable breakfasts, sociable lunches, and many cups of tea and coffee.

Philippe’s collection of objects includes this watering can which of course drew my camera’s eye.

the classic Parisian court. during the first five days it became very mediterranean with the sun blasting in, but on this last day cloud cover kept it grey.

and the view from the windows of the new room (the ante-chamber). I am very lucky to be able to show my collection here, in company with other european designers, plus one japanese designer from Sydney, Akira, and one italian from New York, Matta. we are always  sad to pack up and leave.