Good Elephant Pottery's Blog

This Blog Has Moved!

2010-05-28T23:55:00.002-04:00

I have merged my blog and my website into one address: goodelephant.com

All posts written after May 2010 can now be found at the new location. Update your reading lists and thanks for reading!

-Mea

Delicious and Surreal Dinner Party

2010-05-16T19:35:00.010-04:00

Marlene Skopec has been collecting my pots for years, she now owns 6 entire place settings plus several nice serving pieces. Last weekend she invited me to a dinner party at her house, where the entire meal was served on my pots! This is the first time I have reconnected with my pots, after they had been out in the real world living in a different house. It was a tremendous honor to see how much they are being appreciated. The other dinner guests, Dan and Sarah, confirmed that they have used the pots many times at Marlene's house.

Marlene is an outstanding vegetarian cook, even for an omnivore like myself, the food was a gobble-worthy. The meal ended with tiramisu served from one of my casseroles, and tea brewed in one of my teapots! Surreal!!

What's for Dinner? Casseroles!

2010-04-26T17:51:00.006-04:00

This photo was taken at a workshop that I taught this past weekend. It's a new idea for the Greenbelt Community Center called "Weekend Project," where students learn a new pot design, throw it on Saturday and trim it on Sunday. It's basically a fast-paced "mini-class" for self-directed potters who want a little bit of instruction one project at a time. I'm happy to report this first one went really well! The enrollment filled out fast, and each student turned out a really lovely casserole (or two). Just looking at this photo makes me hungry! Big thanks to the five students, Cass Cooney, Judy Goldberg-Strassler, Sharon Piper, Kori Rice, and Vejune Svotelis, for diving into a new idea with me. The next "Weekend Project" will be planned for the fall session. The next pot design has not been chosen, but I have several suggestions that I am considering. (these workshops will be open to anyone in the DC metro region. Visit www.greenbeltmd.gov/arts to find out how to sign up for programs at the Greenbelt Community Center)

Hourly Earnings, Part 1: Wholesale

2010-04-20T13:36:00.003-04:00

This post is the beginning of a research project. It is the first of several posts on the same topic that I will write throughout this year, and possibly beyond. My pottery business has grown considerably in the past two years, but my ambivalence to let go of my graphic design practice continues. I realized this past winter that I know how much I earn per hour as a designer, because my contracts are based on an hourly rate. It's not an exact number, because it doesn't account for expenses, or for the time I spend doing non-billable work. But it's a pretty good idea. So what I want is the same sense of "knowing" about my pottery business. How much am I really earning per hour by making pots? I don't need an exact answer, just a pretty good idea.

I have heard and read lots of discussions on this subject, but they all come from a backwards and presumptuous point of view, i.e. how much of an hourly wage should I anoint upon myself before I sell my pots? This is a pointless and unresolvable question, because the intangible factors that differentiate every potter are so vast and varied. An exceptionally talented and skillful master should be rewarded as such for his/her time, while an aspiring amateur's time can literally be worth less than zero.

So instead of pondering what I should earn I am going to calculate what I did earn.

Here's my methodology ... whenever possible I will separate pottery sales into quantifiable portions. I will keep track of the time I spend to complete the work. I will subtract any applicable expenses from the sales amount, then divide what remains by the number of hours spent.

The "quantifiable portions" will include wholesale orders, retail art shows and festivals, open houses, registries, etc. (Maybe I'll even settle the debate between the predictable volumes/lower prices of wholesale, vs. the unpredictable sales/longer hours/higher prices of retail?)

How I price my pots ... it's a long-term process. New pot designs start as low-priced prototypes. The prices and designs of fast sellers evolve over time. Slow sellers get eliminated. I compare new designs with the price points of my established good sellers. I also compare my prices with the other potters who are working at the same level as me. I don't want to overprice, because I think a handmade pot is an everyday, down-to-earth object, and should be affordable to average pottery fans. However, I am more careful not to underprice my pots. Underpricing is amateurish, indulgent, and harmful to other professional potters.

Now on to the calculation ... this first calculation is for a large wholesale order. It is the largest order that I wrote at the Buyers Market in February. It contains a good mix of low, medium, and high priced items, therefore I think this will be a good measure of wholesaling in general.

I kept track of the time spent working on it, including the following tasks:

preparing clay (recycling, pugging, wedging)
building pots (throwing, trimming, altering, handbuilding)
loading and unloading the kiln
glazing
studio cleanup
applying hang tags to finished pots
packing for delivery
accounting

I did not track the time spent on tasks that didn't specifically apply to the order, including glaze mixing, or the afternoon I spent carrying a year's supply of clay down the stairs into my basement studio.

From the total dollar value of the order, I subtracted the following expenses which I could quantify:

clay
shipping boxes
a percentage of my Buyers Market expenses, equal to the percentage of Buyers Market sales that this order represented (by far the biggest expense related to this order)

I did not subtract the following expenses which I could not quantify:

glazes
tools/equipment use and maintenance
utilities
bubble wrap and packing peanuts (some purchased, some recycled)

The dollar amount that remained was divided by the total hours spent. And in the end I made $24.74 per hour. My official response to this is "not too shabby!" I feared that I was making less than minimum wage, but the real answer is nowhere close to that. The answer fits my self-evaluation as an up-and-coming, but bona fide professional potter. My time has a good value, but the value still has room to grow, as do my work efficiencies, craft skill, and business development.

One final note about punching an hourly timeclock ... this is not a job that I can do for 8 hours a day like a normal job. The longest I was able to work in one day is 5.5 hours, and at that point my elbows and hamstrings were aching! My usual workday is more like 3 or 4 hours. So that's another issue that I need to address, how to reduce the physical strain of making pots so that I can be more productive per day. (Then again, having worked in the corporate world, I know that many people with 8 hour-per-day jobs don't spend 5.5 of them being productive, so maybe I shouldn't worry about that.)

Coming soon ... I will repeat this calculation for other wholesale orders over the next few months. Maybe different types of orders will have a different result, or maybe I'll get better as the year goes on.

Road Trip to Fallingwater

2010-04-20T09:54:00.005-04:00

I'm not even sure my good ol' Subaru is supposed to hold five adults, but that didn't stop me and four adventurous friends from piling into it and driving 3.5 hours to Fallingwater. (from left to right in the photo: Karen Arrington, Neil Morgenstern, Karen Morgenstern, me, Vejune Svotelis) There was a pottery-related reason for the trip ... I had to deliver a large order of pottery to the Fallingwater Museum Store. So in addition to five people, there were three large boxes packed full of pottery in the back, as we climbed over the mountain ridges between DC and Pittsburgh. Fallingwater is a stunning and glorious place to visit. If you have any interest in art, design, or architecture, go as soon as you can. Here's their website fallingwater.org

Thursday Night Teapots

2010-03-10T11:57:00.006-05:00

My Thursday night Intermediate Wheel class has been asking to make teapots for months, so this session we took the plunge! We did several projects to lead up to this form, like throwing spheres, throwing enclosed forms, and pulling lots of handles. The pots shown above were made by throwing an enclosed form, trimming it on a chuck then cutting off its lid. Then we added thrown spouts and pulled handles. Also in the photo are some of the jars that preceded the teapots. I think they turned out great! The pots in the photo were made by (vaguely from left to right) Lorraine DeSalvo, Carolyn Neuendorffer, Melanie Choe, Andrea Waters, Jeri Holloway, Kuniko Wallis, Quianna Douglas, Margaret Lukomska, and Jamie Consuegra.

Hip to Be Square

2010-03-10T11:38:00.010-05:00

This is a project from my Friday night Advanced Wheel class. This project started last November when several of us went to see the Winterfest show at Baltimore Clayworks (my pots were in that show, along with about 20 other potters). We were all impressed by the pots of Sequoia Miller that we saw there, and soon after I came across a blog post on Sequoia's blog describing how to make Square Lidded Boxes, and we decided to try it! This project was very challenging, we all learned a great deal about altering and assembling, not to mention patience and precision. Furthermore, right after we threw our walls, it started snowing and didn't stop for 3 weeks. ok I'm exaggerating, but due to cancelled classes and the Buyers Market, we didn't get to assemble the pots until 3 weeks after we threw them. I'm happy to report that most of them survived. In this photo, many of the pots are still works in progress, but trust me, the finished pots were outstanding! From left to right in the photo, the pots were made by Karen Morgenstern, Chris Coyle, me, Kori Rice, Christina Guidorizzi, Karen Arrington, and Amy Castner.

After the BMAC: I'm going to be very pale this year ....

2010-02-23T12:49:00.001-05:00

.... because I will spend the next 6 months in my basement making pots! I had a really successful show. I took 19 orders, including 9 from existing accounts and 10 new galleries. Thanks to everyone who wished me safe travels to Philly, the roads were pretty clear and the driving was ok, plus the Rosen Group made our arrival times flexible. The hard part was walking through ankle-deep slush puddles between the convention center and the hotel.

I don't want to sound overly celebratory, because it seemed the show overall had a down atmosphere. And what feels successful to a growing, part-time business might not relate to anyone else's pottery business (my advice to aspiring professional potters, always measure your success by your own self-defined goals, comparing yourself to others is bad for your sanity). My business will grow considerably this year, in spite of a continuing recession, and for that I feel grateful and optimistic. Still no plans to quit my design practice, but like last year I am giving myself permission to make pots full-time for the next few months!

Getting Ready for BMAC: The Big Chill

2010-02-09T11:30:00.003-05:00

So one week before the BMAC (Buyers Market of American Craft) I was feeling pretty good about my planning ... all my pots were fired, my pricelist was printed, I actually had some free time to work on an early order. And then ... we got buried in two feet of snow! My power went out on Saturday morning, and didn't come back until Monday evening. That was 2.5 very cold days, wearing layers of fleece and trying not to stand still.

My Friday night pottery class was cancelled, we rescheduled it for Monday night and it got cancelled again ... because the area roads were still being cleared. We had thrown some pretty ambitious pots the week before, we were planning to alter and assemble them ... now we have to hope they don't dry out before we meet again, which won't be until after the BMAC.

I spent the day Monday packing up my booth for the show, and moving everything into my car. This was partly to stay warm, and partly because there's more snow coming tonight! Another foot or so is forecasted for the DC area and for Philadelphia ... ugh. Now I plan to spend Wednesday night shoveling snow again, and hoping the roads are safe to drive to Philly on Thursday morning. I'm trying not to feel down, I bet every artist in the show is stressing out about traveling this week. I'm telling myself that Thursday will be a long and challenging day, but after that the forecast looks clear, so buyers should be able to attend.

At least I'm glad that all of my planning and packing is done. All I can do now is hope the power doesn't go out again, and brace myself for the next few days.

Holiday Open House 2009

2010-01-02T11:10:00.004-05:00

I held my Holiday Open House on December 12-13. This year I was very pleased to be joined by my friend Nan Rothwell, who brought her salt-glazed functional pots from Faber, Va. (near Charlottesville). I'm a big fan of her work, and of the workshops she conducts at her studio. I got to trade with her (an elephant for a mug), and her pots were fascinating and highly educational for my students who came to see the show. The attendance was great, especially on Saturday! This is my third time holding an open house, so I've figured out a pretty good system now ... transforming my living room into a showroom ... picking the right dates and hours ... what works in terms of marketing, and what doesn't ... this year it felt really easy, like I didn't waste any effort. Can't say the same for Olive, my cat, who was a bit wigged out by the commotion (she forgave me soon).

Festival of Lights 2009

2009-12-09T12:28:00.008-05:00

For the past three years I've done this festival by myself in my own booth. This year the Greenbelt Community Center told its instructors they could invite their students to share their booths. Karen Arrington (another instructor, and also my student in advanced wheel and wood-firing) and I decided to combine our booths into a double booth, then invited other potters from the advanced wheel class.

For some, this was their first experience with selling their pots, so the weekend turned into a class on selling at a craft fair. This was a lot more fun than doing the show by myself. Not only did we share all the heavy lifting and salesmanship duties, but saleswise we did considerably better than I've ever done by myself at this show. This speaks to the strength of our collaborative display. Generally I think group shows are bad for sales, because the display is cluttered and unfocused. But in our case, each potter brought a clearly focused body of work, with a strong concept tying it all together (advanced wheel), so we enhanced each other instead.

Here we are stopping to take a group photo during setup (l-r) Karen Arrington, Kori Rice (with baby Dexter), me, Chris Coyle, Amy Castner, Vejune Svotelis (photo by Barbara Davis with Kori's camera).

Karen, Chris, and Kori putting the final touches on our display.

Our display close-up (photo by Kori).

During the show ... Karen and Amy ring up sales while our booth is packed with shoppers!

Bethesda Row: A Soggy Mess, and a Lesson About Customers

2009-11-11T20:14:00.004-05:00

This year's Bethesda Row Arts Festival was a freezing cold, rain-soaked ordeal. So I left half of my gear at home, just so I wouldn't have to dry it off later, and brought a small display of pots. I had no expectations to make back the expenses of the show, I just hoped that I wouldn't catch a cold.

I was wrong. I was visited by The Good Herd, which is how I affectionately refer to my mailing list of customers. On Saturday it rained non-stop, at times one could look up and down the street and see nobody ... no attendees, and the artists were huddled back in their tents. But I made sales that day to members of The Herd, some of whom have bought my pots often enough that I know their names. They trekked out into the weather because they had something specific to buy, or to start their holiday shopping. On Sunday, the rain was much lighter and more people came out, and the sales were busy all day, to both current and new Herd-sters. Not only did I make back the expenses of the show, I did well even by good weather standards.

So the lesson learned was this ... know who your good customers are, keep them informed about your shows, let them know you appreciate them, and they will make your efforts worthwhile even on the worst weather days.

My brother Won was visiting from California that weekend, so he came to help me pack up at the end of the show. This usually takes me 1.5 hours, but with his help and my "lite" display, we were outta there is 30 minutes! A quick getaway after an exhausting weekend ... sweet!

Wood-Firing Workshop: The Kiln Was Pleased With Us

2009-10-26T16:03:00.016-04:00

(l-r) Karen Arrington, Alan Dowdy, Allison Severance, Karen Wilkening, Carol Wisdom, Jill Harbison, me, Vejune Svotelis, Amy Castner (photo by Blair Meerfeld)

The Greenbelt Community Center's Wood-Firing Workshop took place this month. We loaded and fired the kiln on October 3-4. The kiln belongs to Allison Severance of Boonsboro, Maryland, which is a lovely 1.25 hour drive from Greenbelt.

The workshop started very early on 10/3, we met at 7:30am then carpooled out to the kiln. (It's important to get an early start, because after we left that day, Allison began to pre-heat the kiln, which takes several hours more.) As soon as we arrived, Allison announced "Mea you're driving this bus!" meaning she was letting me direct all of the work. Generally, I feel pretty confident about my knowledge of wood-kilns, but I'm glad that she hung around, cuz I still needed to ask her questions sometimes. Some of my students have several wood-firings under their belt now, and their experience really comes in handy too.

After the pots were loaded (here's Carol Wisdom photographing the fully-stacked kiln), we built the kiln's door out of bricks. This job only needed 3 or 4 people, so everyone else busied themselves by stacking several bales of wood. Allison was grateful and impressed! I'll probably repeat this later ... the potters from Greenbelt are the most outstanding people with whom I've ever wood-fired.

The next day 10/4, we divided ourselves into shifts to fire the kiln. Allison and her boyfriend Blair Meerfeld (who heads the ceramics program at the Art League School in Alexandria, VA) directed the stoking through the morning hours. They put the kiln into reduction from 11am to noon, after which we started stoking for heat rise. Shortly after that, when me and my gang had settled into the stoking patterns, Allison and Blair announced that they were going to run some errands, and would be back in a few hours. Say what??!! "Don't worry Mea! You know what you're doing," Allison said. This is the first time I've been left in charge of a hot kiln. I admit I felt uneasy at first, but like I said before, I was surrounded by outstanding potters, and everybody worked together like a clock. By the time Allison and Blair returned, we had gone past cone 8 (nearly 2300°F) and were almost ready to salt. This is me in my official "in charge" capacity, checking cones through the spyhole (photo by Karen Arrington).

This is Karen Arrington tossing a salt-covered plank into the firebox (photo by Alan Dowdy). Overall we threw 10 pounds of salt into the kiln, examples of beautiful salt-glazed surfaces are shown later. During the salting stage, the chimney's dampers were closed to trap the salt gasses inside, at one point flames burst through the door of the kiln.

Yikes. We quickly opened the dampers and soon the pressure and the fire subsided, but it was a good reminder that wood-firing can be very dangerous (photo by Alan Dowdy). Once the salting was done, we went back to heat rise mode, plowing towards cone 10 (almost 2400°F). We reached temperature around 6:30pm, then we went home, exhausted, dirty, and happy.

The hardest part is waiting A WHOLE WEEK before knowing what happened to our pots! But our patience was rewarded, the kiln load was gorgeous. The unglazed surfaces glowed with rich tones and salt glaze. The celadon was clear with color ranging from gray to yellow to green. The temmoku was particularly nice, ranging from amber to rust red to espresso brown. Some folks even got the copper red glaze to work! Here are just some of the beautiful pots ...

Here is a link to Amy Castner's Flickr album from the workshop, she took great pictures, plus she titled and captioned them in a way that really depicts the sequence of events well.

Big thanks to all the potters in the workshop! They made tremendous efforts towards their pots, the kiln, and each other. They have a spirit of cooperation and learning that is a joy to be around. This is why I think the kiln rewarded us so well.

And million thanks to Allison, for all her help, guidance, and trust, and for making us feel welcome at her home and her kiln! It is truly a beautiful place to visit, and to learn, honor, and celebrate this ancient and mysterious process.

Annmarie Garden: The Great Indoors

2009-09-22T22:51:00.009-04:00

I love a good outdoor art festival, but doing one indoors is a real treat. Artsfest at Annmarie Garden is still mostly an outdoor festival, which I have enjoyed for the last 7 or 8 years (lost count). When they opened their brand new 15,000 sq.ft. Arts Building last year and offered some indoor booths, I pounced! An indoor show means freedom from obsessing about the weather (good for my mental health), leaving my 75 lb. canopy at home (no physical exhaustion at the end), and a level floor (which lets me create a more polished display, and it's safer for the pots). So now there is another level of quality to what was already an outstanding event.

Special thanks to Anne and Jim Williams, who have been letting me stay at their house in Calvert County during this show for several years. It is fun to hang out with them, plus Mary, Jack, and Eli the irresistible dog. "Pet me." "Yes Eli." And many thanks to Karen Grossman, who was my middle school art teacher, and started me towards a life of art. (good teachers make a difference!) She is now a serious potter too, soon to complete an MFA in ceramics at Hood College. Some of her classmates were also in this show, so she came to wish us all well. And she sat in my booth so I could take a break!

Lots of Reed Handles!

2009-08-02T10:14:00.008-04:00

On Saturday, August 1, we wrestled and twisted our reeds into beautiful handles. Many thanks to Carol Wisdom, Vejune Svotelis, Kori Rice, Diana Guillermo, and Kuniko Wallis who took part in the lesson. Here are some of our pots lining up for a group photo (photo by Kori Rice). I can't wait to see all the pots and handles that will be coming to life soon!

Artscape Baltimore 2009: Pottery is like wild bird seed

2009-07-28T12:02:00.001-04:00

I recently heard this on NPR ... credit card companies have determined that people who buy premium wild bird seed are the least likely to default on their debts. (On the other end of the scale, people who buy chrome car accessories are the most likely to default on their debts.) I betcha if handmade pottery was sold with trackable barcodes, credit analysts would see that it is very similar to premium wild bird seed. It's something you buy without obligation. It's humble not flashy, though less expensive choices exist. The value comes from daily small pleasures, not from showing off to your neighbors. People like this are probably not living on the edge financially, and more likely to be weathering this recession safely. Which might explain why I just had my record best show ever at Artscape Baltimore this past weekend.

It also helped that the weather was premium too, not the usual mid-atlantic July haze, but sunny and cool and clear. I also had some very entertaining street theatre performances right next to my booth, which made for a big and happy crowd nearby. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed myself, my pots were a big hit, I saw a lot of friends, I was entertained, I got a tan, all without sweating myself into a puddle.

There was one bad thing ... about $150 worth of things were stolen from my booth. My next door neighbor had some artwork and his iPod stolen. Probably by people who buy chrome car accessories. But this is the first theft I've experienced at Artscape, so I don't hold it against the event, but rather the recession.

Here's a photo of me in my nearly empty booth, towards the end of the show (photo taken by Quianna Douglas, one of my pottery students).

Reed Handle Workshop

2009-06-22T12:40:00.001-04:00

There are still a few spaces open in this workshop I am teaching at the Greenbelt Community Center on August 1.

Learn how to create sturdy, lightweight, and good-looking handles for your pottery by weaving them out of basketry reeds. Ideal for teapots, baskets, trays, and more. Participants may bring their own pot; a cardboard "substitute pot" will be provided for everyone else. Each student will receive enough reed to build one handle during the class, and a second one later on their own time. All materials provided. All skill levels welcome.

To register, call the Greenbelt Community Center at 301-397-2208 and register for the following:

Reed Handle Workshop

Activity #353242-1

August 1, 2009, 1pm - 5pm

Instructor: Mea Rhee

Tuition is $30 for Greenbelt residents; $40 for non-Greenbelt residents

Right now, I am a full-time potter

2009-06-18T20:53:00.000-04:00

This is how my studio looks these days, all the tables and shelves are covered with drying pots. And this is the hallway where the finished pots gather, while waiting to be shipped. I have never made pots at this pace before.

My "desk job" as a graphic designer usually takes up most of my time. I've been growing the pottery business on the side in my limited spare time. But this year, 2009, things have changed.

In February, I took my pots to the Buyers Market of American Craft (BMAC) in Philadelphia, fully expecting to earn some experience but not much more, given how the economy has been pretty rough on the arts. To my surprise I came home with a healthy stack of orders, and I've been potting like crazy ever since.

It won't last (sigh), I will finish the last orders next month, after that I probably won't keep up this production pace (my arms are tired). And big design jobs are on the schedule for later this summer and fall, so it's back to the desk job soon. Don't get me wrong, I am ever grateful for my design clients (from talking to other designers, I know I have the best clients), but it was nice to be a full-time potter for at least a few months.