More ceramic steps in the making

On Friday morning either a momentary sense of panic set in, or else I was "in the zone" - there was a lot of rolling out of porcelain clay going on in the kitchen -
By rolling it between two cloths you can do some interesting texturing - here are a couple of examples, being pierced by the sticks that will fit into those holes. The clay will shrink a bit - but it's better to sharpen the stick than to have the holes too big and have the step sink down...
The nails were put on top of the cloth before rolling - it makes a great texture.

This is one of my favourite stamps - a piece of Victorian (?) glass that Jo found along the Thames at low tide -
The old dishcloth is great for texture -
And the lentils will burn away in the firing.

Another good texture resulted from two layers of net -Some of these have dried beans in the clay - I hope when they burn away, there will be lacy holes, or at least thin areas to let the light through -
Underneath the high table holding the rickety steps, on the dark floor, will be a puddle of clay holding just a few steps-on-sticks. Here it is taking shape -
and here it is with underglaze colour added -it'll be fired next week, as the clay has to dry a bit and it's quite thick (but the colour had to go on before the clay was too dry). Fingers crossed it works -
There's one more day for making more - and all this "raw clay" will be fired to stoneware on Friday, ready for setting up on Monday (22nd) - a bit last minute ... yet again.