Ceramics, week 3

Earlier in the day I had made the fabric shapes for dipping: stitching and gathering, wrapping and pleating, and then steaming in my home-made apparatus, which consists of a square of fabric with corners tied. It fits over a large pan of simmering water, but must not touch the water. You have to be careful with cloth near a flame, so I used my widest pan. The flame was set at its lowest, and I put the corners up on the lid as much as possible -

Safety first!

The steamy parcels

At the class, it was exciting to get the delicate items from last week - intact; they're about 4" tall but my plan (or, hope) is to make them larger -

After the day of winding at Espacio Gallery, I made some balls of cotton wound over crumpled paper, and dipped them, then let them drip. Which gave rise to the idea of letting the stitched fabric drip, rather than puddle - and drying it with a hair dryer so that it would keep its tall shape. Let's see if that works -

Robert suggested painting the fabric with glaze, for stability - it can dry and the fabric can be dipped next week -

This is what went into the kiln - some stamped tiles, filled in with black slip, and five textile creations (fingers crossed) -