Working across a range of making methods including throwing, jollying, casting and hand building, Jane’s signature pieces are both functional and beautiful, working equally alone or as part of a collection. Surface Designs are applied using paper resist and scraffitto and then enhanced with rich earthenware translucent glazes with evocative patterns; these eponymous designs are inspired by time immersed in landscape: Aquitaine, Loire, Carcassonne, Hampstead and Highgate.
Jane’s creative technique reflects her mastery of the craft; she uses painterly techniques to layer up colours giving an impression of three dimensions on flat ceramic surfaces, producing collectable pieces which are both tactile and visual. Energetic brushwork combines with textured tones to evoke the rhythm and dynamism of nature in motion. Sinuous forms are complemented by swooping curves of pattern to create stunning pieces which appear in the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge and the British Council Ceramic Collection at Aberystwyth University and in a number of other Crafts Council selected U.K galleries. She has also exhibited in France, the Netherlands, USA and Japan

My work is about finding beauty in the ordinary. It’s about the small things and recognising the accidental poetry in the unnoticed and overlooked. Living in the city this is often found in apparently insignificant details of the built environment – the way a surface has weathered, the juxtaposition of materials, the sculptural qualities of found forms. Taking an experimental approach to ceramic processes and materials to reflect the forms, colours and textures I find in these places, pieces are mainly hand-built and often fired multiple times. At their best they capture the unexpected, quiet beauty of neglected environments and found objects. I came to ceramics as a second career and graduated from University of Westminster (Harrow) in 2011.

John has been making stoneware pottery in the North Lancashire village of Yealand Redmayne for forty years. The firing process requires a temperature of 1320c, and a smokey/reducing atmosphere in the kiln, which results in rich glaze colours and exciting unpredictable effects on the pots. Most of the pots are classically simple functional shapes, thrown on the wheel, but John occasionally alters the freshly thrown pots to produce one of the signature forms for which he is well known.
Since 1989 he has regularly exhibited and given workshops in Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand, and throughout the UK.
In 1990 John was elected a fellow of the Craft Potter's Association of Great Britain.
jandvcalver@gmail.com

An apprenticeship in France and several visits to Italy introduced Daphne Carnegy to the delights of earthenware and in particular tin-glazed ware, often referred to as ‘maiolica’. Additional training at Harrow School of Art refined and developed her skills and confirmed her commitment to low-fired pottery.
The attraction of maiolica for Daphne lies in its unique qualities - a softness, depth and luminosity of glaze and colour not to be found in other ceramic techniques, the transformation of the pigments in the firing, and the variations of intensity and texture of the pigments as they fuse and shift with the glaze. The many variable elements – body, glaze and pigment thickness, firing temperature – all conspire to create continual surprises on opening the kiln.
Daphne makes a range of thrown, and sometimes hand-built, painted tin-glazed earthenware which combine an awareness of historical precedents with her passion for plants.
Author of the highly acclaimed Tin-glazed Earthenware (A & C Black, 1993), and Maiolica (A & C Black Ceramics Handbook, 2011).

Matthew’s influences and inspirations for his circular sculptures include geometric and optical art, constructivist themes, and modern architecture and design. He pursues these interests in an abstract sense by exploring shape and making mathematically constructed pieces in clay, each built up of many different wheel-thrown sections. On completion, each form conveys different and individual properties of space, light, and colour, and sustains an expression of abstract and rhythmical beauty from its pattern of shape.
Following a six year apprenticeship with Phillip Wood in Frome, Somerset, Matthew went on to gain a BA (Hons) 1st Class in ceramics at BSUC, Bath. He then went to the Royal College of Art, obtaining an MA in Ceramics and Glass. He has won numerous awards both in the UK and overseas including; The Ceramic Review Prize Awarded at Ceramic Art London and The Poole Pottery Award at New Designers. His work can be found in public collections in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, the National Museum, Scotland, the Swiss national museum of ceramics and glass – the Musée Ariana, Geneva and the Musee National de Ceramique de Sevres, France and private collections worldwide.

Technique : Hand built porcelain works, polished and fired in electric kiln.
The decorative patterns are made by lamination technique: I start with a vision of the final pattern in mind, working backwards, decide how many sheets of different thickness of white, grey and black stained porcelain are needed to be cut and layered, in a special sequence to form blocks. These blocks are cut again into slices, along the side, at an angle, or at different thicknesses, and re-layered, to arrive at the desired block of pattern.
Every block of pattern is unique and cannot be replicated.
A thin slice is cut from the final block, rolled thinner to give an organic movement to the pattern, templates are cut out, and the piece is hand-built.
After all the cutting and layering processes, the final porcelain patterned sheet is very fragile, and highly prone to cracking after firing.
On one hand the material is very fragile, on the other hand the patterns are lively and full of force.
This is like what I observe in nature, water flows smoothly around corners and yet have tremendous power, flowers so delicate and come in million of shapes and colours, birds so fragile but fly swiftly and effortlessly everywhere.
I am inspired by what I observe, I design my works to capture the lightness, the movement and the delicacy in nature that is so beautiful.
The forms and the vibrant patterns of my work attract the eyes, urge viewers to touch them, and be a pleasure to hold and use.

Linda works from her studio at home in Winchester, Hampshire, England. A family tradition of lace making and sewing along with a love of fabrics, textures and patterns has always influenced Linda's work with clay. Dishes, vessels, bowls and vases are constructed from soft slabs of porcelain or stoneware clays decorated using wax resist, oxides and a palette of blue and green stains and glazes.
Her own hand carved ceramic stamps inspired by local flora and fauna plus gathered grasses and leaves from countryside, garden and allotment also provide her with delicate silhouettes to add to the final design. A discipline of drawing everyday and printing with lino has recently led her to begin a new body of work. Small porcelain vessels are thrown and decorated with inlaid line drawings to enhance and describe form and shape.
As with Linda's slab built pieces, delicate surface patterns and textures add to the impact on the senses, reaching out and demanding to be held and investigated.
All work is fired in an electric kiln to 1220c

I have worked as a full time professional potter since 1974. We still make porcelain for use in the home, but since 2001, I have focused on making reduction fired lustreware. Alan Caiger Smith and William De Morgan have both been important influences on this work.
The porcelain we use is vitrified, at 1265C, then given two more firings. The decoration is applied freehand with a brush, using the ancient technique of clay paste lustre. I work with full time assistant Kerry Bosworth, and helper Pasha Manzaroli. Bernard Leach was the inspiration of my youth, but over the years, changing times, fashions and interests have all affected my pots. Now I feel I have found a medium which resonates most for me.
Our workshop is near Pevensey in East Sussex, where the showroom is open to the public every day except Sundays and Bank Holidays.

My work is about simple forms imbued with a sense of spontaneity.
'Raku' as a philosophical approach allows me the opportunity to embrace the element of surprise, seeing and knowing then becoming as important as the making.

Roger’s work centres on ideas derived from observations of the sea along the coast near his home – its colours, power, sense of rhythm and depth are of particular interest. Situations and moments observed are distilled to their essence for use in the form and surface. “My work results in various vessel forms, sometimes quite large. I often use various brushed matte and running glazes. They are intended to interact during the firing and give a strong sense of depth to the surface. All the work is once-fired in reduction, to cone 11, above 1300 degrees. My Individual work is all thrown in porcelain.” Roger’s work is exhibited widely, in the USA, in galleries across Europe and Asia. He regularly exhibits at Ceramics Fairs in Britain and around Europe, is a full member of the Devon Guild of Craftsmen and runs a studio and gallery in North Devon.

One day, many years ago, inspired by an article by Dick Lehmann, I tried out a glaze new to me: a carbon trap. Since that day I have been chasing the shino dragon. It really is an intriguing glaze: remarkable in its variety but mysterious. I think that each potter who works with this shino brings out the qualities he seeks in it, as a rose breeder perpetuates specific characteristics of scent or colour in a rose. It is so unusually responsive to the atmosphere in the kiln and even to the weather once the glaze is on the pot that each potter can focus on - and develop - those characteristics he seeks. Thus, different potters will garner quite distinctive effects even though they may use the same recipe and fire to the same temperature in the same type of kiln. For myself, I mostly seek the dramatic contrast that one can obtain from the charcoal of the carbon trapping and the amber comet trails of liquid wax, enhanced by rivulets of rose ash.

Nowadays, I work with four or five different carbon trap shinos on clays with varying quantities of iron, from Limoges porcelain to the black clay of St Amand. The pots are fired in a fiercely reducing atmosphere to 1280’C.

Since my invaluable apprenticeship at Aldermaston Pottery, I have had studios in Hampshire, America and France. For the last twenty years I have been living and working in Ewelme, Oxfordshire.

My work is inspired by the history, people and geology of south Wales which I have studied and promoted throughout my career.

The communities of the South Wales Coalfield are connected by the hidden geology. The layers of coal, ironstone and clay which fuelled the industrial revolution show the power of nature which has distorted and split the strata. I use the layers, the geological pressures, as well as the voids created by extraction within my work as a metaphor for the way that history and memories are buried and distorted with time and distance.

Working with porcelain allows me to explore the hidden. Geological layers are built within blocks of clay, in a loose Nerikomi fashion. By thinly slicing sections and rolling I aim to integrate the translucence of porcelain into my work, creating simple forms that allow people to see the layers hidden within the thin walls. To contrast with this I also use a version of Kurinuki to carve into solid blocks of the geological, layered porcelain, creating natural looking edges, and then allowing fissures to open during firing, giving a glimpse of what lies beneath the surface.

I received a very good training in the Ceramics Department, Wolverhampton Polytechnic and was awarded First Class Honours. The training was formative, we were encouraged to explore and research widely. Afterwards I completed a Post Graduate Course in Art & Design History at Birmingham Polytechnic. This was important to me as I discovered many Artists and Designers whose work interested and intrigued me. Afterwards I was offered a part-time lecturing post (Pottery) in a Teacher Training College in Birmingham. This lasted for three years, I then transferred to the School of Ceramics & Glass in the Faculty of Art & Design, Birmingham Polytechnic where I taught part-time for several years.
My Studio was established in 1978 and is a short distance from my home in Dudley. during this time I have used many types of clay. Currently I use a fine Porcelain concentrating on making wall panels, dishes & brooches. The clay is coloured with oxides & lustres during a course of three firings. porcelain fascinates me as it combines fragility with great strength having to withstand high temperatures. I also enjoy persuading the clay to fire flat. The themes are invariably trees, leaves and flowers combined with the playful qualities of Naive Art I am interested in traditional patterns often incorporating them into the panel borders. I visit France frequently and love the linear qualities of the landscape which often appears in my work. I have exhibited my work in Events and Galleries in the UK and France

Born in Derbyshire, Jo studied at North Staffordshire Polytechnic and taught in schools and colleges for many years. She now teaches occasional short courses at West Dean College in Sussex and gives talks/demonstrations and specialist workshops to various groups, working from her studio in historic Market Bosworth, Leicestershire.
She is the author of two books: The Potters Guide to Ceramics Surfaces (2002) and Colouring Clay (2007). A member of the CPA and the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists.
Jo is known for her experimental approach to coloured clays, which she manipulates during the making so that the surface pattern is integral with the form. Twisting, laminating and distressing creates exciting effects and the resulting surfaces are of an intriguingly tactile nature, sometimes stretched and stressed, almost in the same way as geological forces affect the earth’s crust. Jo fires her work at earthenware or stoneware temperatures depending on effects required, and each piece is completely individual. She makes vessels, platters, wall panels and sculptural forms, sometimes using mixed media. A fun range of larger sculptures is particularly suitable for gardens and patios. Jo’s ideas stem from the natural world - elements of landscape, seascape, rock strata and plant structure can be clearly recognised. She seek to echo and interpret some of the qualities observed in nature using a language

Individual stoneware pots, distinctive for my painterly exploration of colour and texture - forms are wheel-thrown, sometimes altered, in T material/stoneware clay mix. My technique of layering vitreous slips onto the exterior surface is the result of many years of experimentation, which began whilst I studied for a BA (hons) degree at Bristol (University of the West of England). I mix the slips from raw materials with primary stains, which give me an infinite range of subtle colours. Artistic inspiration comes from the effects of light and weathering on architecture and artefacts, together with dramatic land and seascape. Since graduating in 1987, I have exhibited widely throughout the UK and abroad.

The dishes are slipware, made to be used; they are press-moulded earthenware, decorated with slips and glazed with a food-safe glaze, fired in an electric kiln to 1100 degrees.
The ground colour is brushed, the lettering slip-trailed, and the figures etc transferred off newspaper cutouts, sgraffito’d before application to the damp clay. The crispness of the cut paper contrasts with the gentle relief of the slightly raised image, and the soft form of a moulded dish.
Some dishes are inscribed, the overall design of the dish echoing the sense of the words. The images occupy “flat land”, the limited perspective sometimes working with the two dimensions of the surface, sometimes challenging it.

Beautifully ugly… or the otherway round!

The Peak District landscape and seasons are the springboard to everything I make. In essence, wood-fired pottery on the border between function and sculpture, adapting work, clays and glazes with materials ‘won' in the landscape but usually not stopping there.

I hope the work is playful, sometimes jarring, surprising, brutal, delightful and that ultimately there is a resonance between their materiality and the landscape from which they derive.