The Practical Potter: A Step-by-step Handbook - Tapa blanda

This is a comprehensive guide to ceramics with step by step projects and techniques. This practical, accessible approach to ceramics introduces techniques that form the basic vocabulary for your work. Six sections cover Design, Handbuilding, Making and Using Moulds, Throwing, Glazing and Decoration, and Kilns and Firing. Over 30 projects include a diverse range of technical and creative possibilities with clay - from a simple hand-coiled pot needing the minimum of equipment, to a wheel-thrown cup and saucer, or a press-moulded plate with printed overlays. More than 800 specially commissioned colour photographs include step-by-step intructions and images of finished works from over 80 leading ceramic artists. "The Practical Potter" brings sound knowledge of the main ceramic methods to both the novice and the practising maker wanting to enrich and extend their approach to design and technique. Following an introduction on choosing and preparing clay and the workshop, the first section gives an insight into ideas and techniques for design. Each of the subsequent chapters features a rich array of step-by-step projects that demonstrate the methods being taught. Every project is a unique work of art that will give valuable insights into how to successfully combine the many ideas and techniques available. Accessible and inspiring, this book uncovers both the practical essentials and the creative secrets of working with clay.

Josie Warshaw has had her own studio since 1983 from where she continues to make ceramic work for commission or exhibition. She was accepted on the Crafts Council's Selected Index of Makers in 1995, and her work is also represented at Contemporary Applied Arts in London.