Recap: July Clay Club at the Melting Mountain Pottery "kiln zone" in Marshall

Thanks to Joey Sheehan for hosting Clay Club at his Melting Mountain Pottery "kiln zone" in Marshall! Joey showed us his Bourry box kiln, which was cooling from its third firing while we were there. He talked about building the kiln and how it fires, and what he had learned from the first two firings. He also talked about how wood firing makes him slow down and be a little more thoughtful about his work.

Some details on the third firing: it started at 7 pm on Saturday and ended at 8:05 pm on Monday. Joey used 3 and a half cords of wood in this firing. So far, all the wood he's used in firing this kiln has been waste that someone else has been throwing out.

Meanwhile, Joey was also firing his fast fire wood-salt kiln. He started the firing at 10 am Wednesday morning and as of about 6:30 pm that day (during Clay Club), cone 5 was getting soft. The firing continued during Clay Club. He built this kiln from an old electric kiln. Check out this video by John Britt:

Don't try this at home kids. (Or "Hold my beer and watch this...) Joey Sheehan,at Clay Club, blowing wood ash into his Kiln McKilnface .

A video posted by John Britt (@john.britt1) on Jul 14, 2016 at 8:25am PDT

As Joey said: "It's not an experiment unless you hit the max."

A number of Clay Clubbers delivered work to Joey to be included in this firing; he'll keep us posted on picking it up.

Thanks again to Joey for hosting an awesome Clay Club and making it possible for folks to participate in the fast fire wood-salt firing, and to everyone who came!