Welcome to the workshop! I originally graduated in Ceramics at West Surrey College of Art & Design in 1983 - where I researched ceramic sculpture and architecture through terracotta bricks & tiles. It was almost ten years later when I worked with John Huggins at his Ruardean Garden Pottery that my passion for making pottery itself (in the throwing pots sense) was awakened. As a potter I am inspired by the rich heritage of "rustic" traditional kitchen wares, and my aim is to make pots using that "country pottery" approach and technology. Pots that have an 'ease' and functionality - that feel good and work well.
	To this end I've pared the materials I use and the way things get made right down: A clay, a slip and glaze or two, the wheel, and a minimum of "fuss" so that design goes hand in hand with economy in making and in use. I love the earthenware medium (a.k.a."terracotta" - which is Italian, meaning cooked earth). It goes right back through everyday life to Neolithic times simply because it's the most common and easily fired clay.
	This doesn't as it happens, make it less beautiful as a material - which can bear warm tones and all the complementary flashes and flares from it's firing. It's also amazingly useful, as good people have discovered and drawn its structural and porous properties into the heart of their life, language and culture.
	As I make pots in series - I work like a cook or baker and I enjoy the rhythms of slicing, sprinkling, stirring... mixing this energy into the look & decoration. And it's to cooking itself that I dedicate my pots & pans. Bon appetite!