How to Make a Handmade Pottery Teapot — Narrated Version

in this week's video i'm going to be showing you how i throw and put together my teapots like always it starts off with wedging these balls of clay weigh one and a half pounds or about 680 grams they are wrapped in plastic to keep them nice and soft but first here's a quick little preview of the form and shape we're after this is still a relatively new shape i've been making but i think i still need to make a few more iterations before i'm really happy with them anyhow let's get started i throw these pieces on wooden bats as you see here the bodies of the teapots the chamber that holds the tee is arguably the most complex component being able to lift them off afterwards once they're thrown on top of this wooden platform means there's no chance i can distort the rim or the shoulder or the gallery where the lid fits on with draw parts of the teapod that i want to stay straight and level so the mdf throwing bats really help this the process you've been seeing is called centering which is arguably the most fundamentally important part of throwing on the wheel it's when you remove all of the inconsistencies and wobbles and if any of them remain they'll remain throughout the duration of throwing the vessel so they can be a real hindrance once the clay is perfectly scented i can begin to open it up here i'm forming the wide base of the teapot i leave the clay here a little thicker than usual as it's such a large expanse and i use my thumb here to compress the clay down and to form an almost right angle inside the teapot which helps me easily pull all the clay upward using my knuckle on the outside and my fingers on the inside which are pinching against it whenever you're pulling the walls up on a pot and this goes for any vessel your movements have to be consistent i start from the bottom and i slowly go up to the top i don't rush i don't stop i don't hesitate and only once i reach the top so i very gently release my grip gentle being the important word as if you release too suddenly or with too much speed you'll very easily put a wobble into the rim of the piece which again can be very difficult to get rid of with any vessel like a teapot or a lidded vessel you need to leave enough clay in the upper half of the walls to allow you to create the gallery later on if instead you were to throw them very thin and razor sharp towards the rim there's very little you can do as you haven't left enough material to work with once the height is achieved i sponge out the water from the inside and begin to clean off the outside first i scrape away this skirt with an old blunted turning tool and then i begin to rip off the outside smoothing the walls removing the slip which also creates a much stronger wall which will be beneficial for when we alter the top of the pot later on now it's time to form the gallery and i do that by gently coloring in the top applying even pressure with each of my digits surrounding the rim and because i left these parts the walls relatively thick means i can start to throw them again into my desired shape this process always tends to be a little bit of both throwing and then collaring in then doing a bit more throwing until i think the opening is more or less the right diameter which i'll then check with a pair of calipers these are set to a specific measurement which i've already taken and i tend to throw all my teapot bodies and then throw all the lids which makes working a bit more succinct and a bit more efficient as long as all your measurements are correct and once the rim and the gallery are more or less there i'll start to remove this slip on the rest of the vessel which neatens it up and also if you remove all the slip the pot will dry a lot faster once you've taken them off the wheel which helps to speed up my production otherwise you can be waiting for days for all your pots to turn leather hard so you can finish them generally i think it's good practice to leave your pots in that state they'll be neater they'll dry faster and they'll look better i'm working very delicately here at the top of the pot i don't want to push down too hard otherwise the top shoulder of the vessel can easily sink down and lastly i'll just use a chamois leather to smooth off the rim this is always more or less the final thing i do to the pot before removing it from the wheel this scraping i do here of the bat is simply to make things cleaner later on it means when i put the bats onto my wear boards and on my tables they're not covering everything in wet slip i then separate the pot from the bat just by sliding a wire underneath and then use my old blunted turning tool to pry off the bat and set it aside which marks the first item finished of three thrown components which need to be made for each teapot and like i said to speed up my production i always throw all my teapots then i throw all the lids and then finally i throw all the spouts i make the lids from six ounces of clay which is 170 grams as these are smaller i roll them out quickly like this compressing them squashing them which forces the air bubbles out and then setting them aside i always make a few extra lids just in case i ruin a few or for whatever reason some don't fit later on down the line the same goes for the spouts too these are really fast to throw in comparison to the teapot bodies so i don't bother wrapping them in plastic or anything i then take my calipers which have the measurement of the internal diameter for the teapots and i inverse them that way i can measure the flange of the lid and make sure it's the correct size to fit in which in this instance was about 5.7 centimeters if i remember correctly the lids are far more simple objects and as there's no height in them they're really really quick to make essentially i'm just separating the outer edge of the lid and the internal locating flange which will be the component that fits into the teapot although centering smaller lumps of clay can be a challenge in itself i find myself using the palms of my hands and the balls of my thumb much more than my fingertips it's completely different once i've opened up the round disc of clay i use my index finger with water to separate it into two components what you're seeing is currently the lid being thrown upside down so the part i measure here is the part that will fit inside the gallery of the teapot i've done so many of these types of lids over the years that i can more or less eyeball the dimensions these days then like on the teapot itself i remove the slip and i neaten up the form these are quite thickly potted objects and that's because later on i'm going to trim them a lot especially on the top portion which is the underside of them now so in many ways this is kind of the rough base shape which i'll later then be finishing further lastly i use my blunted turning tool again to remove the slip on the outside making it nice and dry which is essential for picking these off the wheel like you'll see in a second once i've wired them off which i do very carefully i'll quickly dry off my hands and then place them around like this twist and lift off and that's it for the lids the spouts are thrown differently i throw them atop a large massive clay which is a process we call throwing off the hump i'm only ever really working on the very top portion of this so there's no need to worry if the clay below isn't centered properly i measure out a small portion by cupping the clay in my hands and then gradually begin to throw the clay inward as this whole process is essentially one of just colouring in the clay into an ever narrower shape it's vital that your clay is really well centred otherwise it'll just buckle and twist given the chance once the basic shape is there i'll use the end of a wooden tool to insert into the spout and then from the outside i'll coax the clay up against it this ensures that the internal diameter inside the spout remains open enough for the tea to pour nicely and i should note that before i insert it inside i dip the wooden tool in water just so it can't stick to the clay as it dries inside now i have the shape i want i can go back to skimming off the slip on the outside and i very delicately shammy off the rim of the spout barely putting any pressure on it at all just running it over the clay i then create an undercut and then very carefully wire it through so that i can remove it from the hump of clay and then i can simply start throwing another one from where the last one came off it's like a conveyor belt the previous one always leads into the next and that's it for the thrown components the easy part really assembling them nicely is all together a different ball game the following morning i'll quickly wrap up my spouts i don't want these getting too dry because if they become really leather hard it'll actually make them more difficult to attach to the teapots as for the lids and the bodies i want these to be properly leather hard trimmable like you'd normally expect i'd say one of the hardest things about making teapots is simply teaching yourself how to juggle around all the components and ensure they're all at the right dryness when you need them and really that just takes time and experience you need to fail a few times before you begin to get it right every time and believe me i still definitely don't get it right every time so let's begin i always intentionally throw the locating flange on my lids to be a millimeter or two larger than necessary this means i can trim it back to be almost the perfect size to fit the teapot rather than risk it being too small and rattling and not fitting properly so to do this i center my lid and then i just offer up the teapot to the flange to see if it fits if it doesn't quite i can simply remove some of the clay from this flange and then check it again the good thing about my teapot lid and bodies is that they both sort of act as a chuck for the other piece meaning i can position the pot on top of the lid here and i can trim it or later on when the body of the teapot is down on the wheel i can just simply place the lid on top of it and trim the lid that might be tricky to understand but you'll see what i mean later on finally for these lids i just removed some of the masks from the interior and i go over some of the sharper edges with my fingertips just to smooth them off next it's time to trim the body which is more complicated procedure first i put some water on the base before rubbing the pot into place in the center of the wheel the friction created and the slip helps to weld the piece really steadily into the middle but for a little added security i use a plastic grip here to squash down the bottom bit of clay this just acts as an extra seal to hold it in place i should note the ledge you see in the middle here the line is purely a decorative motif there's no functional reason for it it's simply a line on which my glaze will be able to react nicely over anyhow all i'm doing here is removing a bit of the mass from the outside of the pot straightening it and making the whole vessel a bit lighter i've always really liked light delicate pots but more so the glazes i use are actually quite thick and heavy so if i make pots that are a little bit chunkier and then use a heavy glaze they'll end up being really heavy at the end so i have to compensate by making my pots just a bit lighter than usual which is a good thing for me as i really love to trim it's when you can refine and neaten pots making them delicate and light and special i'll then switch to a smaller tool just to refine this little ledge here making it sharper and more pronounced and you can actually see that the pot is wobbling a little bit and i don't let that bother me these are wobbles on such a minute scale that you'll never see them again unless you were to put the pot back on the wheel and spin it in the grand scheme of things they're totally inconsequential and after all i'm making handmade pottery this is an industrially made factory made ceramics inherently i want the pots to have character i want each one to be a little bit different from the other anyway let's get on to the lid you can see here what i meant about the body of the teapot acting as a chuck for the lid i can simply drop it in and then trim the entirety of the outer walls and the top without worrying about using any balls of clay or arms to hold it tightly in place and again i'm just simply removing mass making it proportionately more relatable to the body beneath and cleaning it up which the top needs the most which is this portion from this area i want to remove all the wiring off lines and also trim a hollow in the top of the lid this concave region will act as a pool in which the glaze can gather in as the thicker it is the nicer it looks so once that's hollowed out i just use my fingertips to neaten off that sharp edge on the outer side before piercing the lid with a hole cutter which is quite essential for teapots as it creates a hole which air can be drawn through as you pour the tea out which prevents the liquid from glugging if you were to try and pour without a hole and have a sealed interior the tea would come out and splutters and it would pour very badly i then turn the lid upside down and center it to clean up the exit wound from where the hole puncher went through it only needs a light touch but it's these little subtleties that make all the difference once the piece is finally fired for instance there's those little burs that this creates that could end up acting as a ridge for the glaze to clog on and therefore block the hole the body and lid are almost finished next it's time to work on the bottom so i slice it off the wheel scrape away the excess as i don't want to put the lid back onto something dirty that will imprint on it then i very delicately put the lid down get it centered and position the teapot back over top i also just tack on three small dots of clay around the lid just to make sure it doesn't slide out of place as nothing's really holding down the teapot i position a bottle cap on top which i can then push down through which evenly distributes the pressure sort of like lying down on thin ice it prevents the wide base from bowing inward and potentially collapsing on this outer edge i'm just trimming the beveled edge which is preferential on functional pottery as the base of the pot is what takes the most abuse they're banged on tables and put away into cupboards and if it were a fine sharp edge it would very easily chip but a beveled edge helps prevent that i then carefully remove the wiring off marks across the base and then use a flat metal kidney just to burnish off the clay smoothing it and removing any trimming marks that remain the base of the pot is just as important as any other part of it even if you never see it or never touch it in my opinion it should be finished with just as much care and finally i get to stamp it with my maker's mark this is when i hand carved and fired in a soda kiln so it's very personal very sentimental to me but essentially it's just my signature my maker's mark it's what identifies this part with my hand and with that that's all the trimming complete now we can move on to finally assembling the teapot when i'm making teapots i always finish one at a time so i'll trim a piece attach the spout pull the handle before i begin trimming the next piece it would probably be fast if i trimmed them all then attached all the spouts and then pulled all the handles but i just prefer to do it in this routine next is the spout so i take one of the ones i've thrown and i slice it off at about a 45 degree angle the lower half of these is just waste at this point and i'll just let them go bone dry before recycling them i offer up the spout to the teapot to check it looks good and then i remove some of the mass from the inside making it thinner you can only really throw the clay so thin so at this stage i can move much more than i would be able to do otherwise but i'm working carefully here the clay is still quite tacky so if i were to try and remove too much at any one time it's quite easy to tear or ruin the spout i then take a diddler which yes is its proper name which i then use to fettle the inside of the spout smoothing off all the edges perfectly so there are no throwing rings or any incision marks left from the knife and finally i just use my finger to compress some of the clay back as the process of fettling tends to reveal all the little specks of sand so with a finger i'm just pushing them back in making it really smooth again it's a little close up so you can see what it looks like inside obviously the smoother the walls the more smoothly the liquid will flow which again helps for a better pour i then position the spout again and mark around it with a sharp potter's needle and i also as a little bonus tip position the spout in a little pool of water which softens the clay that'll be joined to the body of the teapot which makes the whole process very easy i then carefully begin to pierce in the holes in the defined area that i previously scored out again you might notice that i'm holding the tool at about a 30 degree angle this is another step taken to ensure that the liquid can pour out with more ease these holes are here to prevent the tea leaves or tea bags from getting stuck in the spout and clogging up the teapot once all the holes have been pierced i use the wooden end of my potter's needle just to place them inside and rotate them a bit this tidies them up greatly it's also worth noting that once these have turned bone dry i have a special sponge on the end of a stick which i use to grate away and fettle all the burrs of clay they're from the exit wounds of these pierced holes again removing any birds of clay that might encourage the glaze to clog i then score the surrounding area with a serrated kidney and brush on a bit of wet slip i then take the spout from the water making sure i don't leave it in there too long otherwise the clay can begin to disintegrate and i carefully position it on the teapot i push it firmly in place and also make sure it's in line with the holes there are lots of double checks at this stage with the lid on just to make sure all the proportions are working properly and i check again to make sure it's in line with everything then i begin to slowly blend in the clay of the spout into the teapot body with this particular design of teapot i have to take great care that i don't ruin the lines that are directly below or above the spout as these sharp lines and ledges need to remain intact and nice and crisp so they can interact with the glazes properly this definitely makes blending the spout into the body far more difficult but it's worth it in the long run i think with this particular design anyway for those hard to reach areas i'm using just the flat edge of one of my hole pieces and then i go back to my diddler or a sponge on a stick just to smooth off everything afterwards and finally i'll use the pads of my fingers just to compress all those burs of sand back into the clay body and creating a nice smooth even surface the positioning of the spout is very important you want it to be at least shoulder height or gallery height where the tip is if it's too low you'll barely be able to fill up the teapot and all the liquid will just come rushing out far too early and lastly and this isn't something i do for every teapot i just quickly trim that top shoulder edge just to make sure it's nice and crisp and now we move on to the last step which is pulling and attaching the handle as i'm making a whole batch of tea bots i start off with a large block of clay from which i'll be able to pull many individual smaller handles from the key here is quick movements with enough water for lubrication and with consistent even pressure throughout your entire pool it's a very similar process in many ways as to when you're pulling up the walls of clay when you're throwing the pot if you stop and start or your pools are uneven you'll end up with a wonky handle or wonky walls so confident quick movements are absolutely necessary once i have a length i'm happy with i'll take it over to a wear board and i'll slice off each one just with the corner of my thumb these are the rough basic shapes which i'm going to then reattach to the teapots and pull again refining them further and just like when i'm throwing my lids and spouts i always pull a few extra just in case anything goes wrong if it were a hotter day i would even stack these on top of each other afterwards just so they stay nice and wet as ideally i want to attach them as soon as i can after they've been pulled now as when they firm up they become more difficult to attach and pull neatly so again i score and slip the body of the teapot making sure the area i'm doing it in is in perfect alignment with the spout in front scoring and slipping is sort of like gluing on a part of clay it just ensures that the join is nice and strong but you needn't always do it and actually it's the angle of the joint here which would make doing it any other way quite difficult you'll see when i pull the handle and attach to the base i don't use any slip or anything i then take one of the handle blanks and i tap out one end this creates a flare of clay and provides me with material which i'll easily be able to blend into the teapot body this handle blank is then pushed into the teapot really quite firmly i leave the lid in situ here to stop any deforming happening due to the pressure of me applying the handle and once it's firmly attached i can begin to neaten up the join and blend in that clay making sure the join is very strong is vital as there's nothing worse than beginning pulling and simply tearing off the handle as the clay is really soft it's very easy to blend in although the one downside of it being soft is that it's very easy to ruin it so a delicate touch is required it's just one of those things you need to get enough practice to be comfortable with really but i've always felt that pulling handles with this method is one of the best the handles feel natural they spring from the pot and flow out of it rather than looking kind of obviously stuck on once properly joined it's time to pull again this time i'm really thinning out the handle and with each pull i'm making sure that i start with my fist as close to the teapot as possible as to get the entire length as thin and even as i possibly can as soon as i feel like there's any friction i'll dunk my right hand back into the water as as soon as your hand sticks to the handle or the handle sticks to your hand the chances that you'll tear it off are really high i then change my grip to more of a pinch and i use my thumb to dig in near the top of the handle and draw out that last thickness of clay i also use this moment to create three distinct lines in the back of the handle grooves which not only ergonomic when it comes to holding the pot and pouring it but the grooves allow the glazes to pull into them really nicely once the handle is at the right kind of length i carefully arch it downward and join it towards the base and again this whole time i've been careful not to interrupt those two important lines the one around the waist and the shoulder line towards the top due to the angle of which this bottom part of the handle joints i can very easily just smear the clay in either side without having to score or slip it although take this with a pinch of salt as this really depends on the type of clay body you're using in fact many of the methods i've shown you in this video might not work that well for your particular clay so some trial and error is always needed all i'm doing here is pushing up towards the top of the handle just to make sure the arch is exactly how i like it i'm also using a wetted finger just to smooth over any of the finger marks that might remain and that's more or less it finished anything else is just a tiny little bit of quality control it really does take a long time and that's why handmade teapots can cost as much they do these are my own designs these teapots they're specific to me in a way i'm kind of cautious sharing them so openly like this but i hope that providing this information and showing you how i do it will give you some insight and help your own practices one last thing i do is i turn the teapots upside down this allows the still wet handle to dry naturally downward retaining its shape whereas if you were to leave them the right way up overnight there's a chance as they dry they could just droop a little bit so this is how i leave them overnight draped in plastic too so they don't dry out too quickly ideally you want all the components to dry out naturally slowly together you don't want to rush anything as that's when cracks can occur and then the day after i'll reposition them the right way up give them a good check over one last time and then i'll cover them with plastic in the long term to dry slowly over a couple of days teapots are such a challenge because they combine so many different aspects of pottery there's the throwing the accurate trimming combining spout and body and pulling handles it really is such a lot of work and more than that it takes years and years of practice to get it right anyhow i'll leave you with two little finished examples of what these teapots look like once fired thanks for watching you

Channel: Florian Gadsby

Views: 276,926

Rating: 4.9412556 out of 5

Keywords: pottery, ceramics, how to turn pottery, how to trim pottery, Florian Gadsby, floriangadsby, how to make pottery, trimming pottery, turning pottery, Asmr pottery, handmade pottery, stoneware pottery, pottery for beginners, Asmr, handmade ceramics, pottery wheel, how to make teapots, pottery teapots, ceramic teapots, how to make clay teapots, clay, teapots, teapot, making teapots, stoneware teapot, how to make a teapot, how to throw a teapot, handmade teapot, asmr pottery, handmade

Id: OT61DK1mjJU

Length: 23min 22sec (1402 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 20 2020