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child showing his clay fish made at hellens garden festival 2018

Always a joy to be working the idyllic grounds of Hellens near Much Marcle.

Every year the beautifully tended house and grounds are the setting for a Garden Festival open to the general public. More often than not we’re asked to provide ‘make and take away’ clay workshops for young visitors and their families.

This year Aimee and Immy were in attendance on the Saturday and Sarah took up the reins on Sunday.

Over the two days, countless participants made pinch pot fish to take home to paint.

clay fish drying on a board in herefordshire garden festival

Here’s a small selection left with us whilst their makers enjoyed the rest of the show without having o lug their creations around with them. Pleased to report all the fish were collected at the end of the event.

If you took part in the drop-in workshops and managed to paint your creation we’d love it if you could email us a picture: admin@eastnorpottery.co.uk

MakerShack frontage at Cheltfest

Nearly 10,000 people enjoyed tinkering with materials in The Maker Shack at the Cheltenham Science Festival 2018 – and nearly all of them designed and made a clay tile at the Eastnor Pottery station!

It was the second year running Olivia Clements requested the services of the Flying Potter so we knew what to expect in terms of sheer volume of participation….and we weren’t disappointed!

The event was exhausting and needed team Eastnor Pottery & The Flying Potter to work shifts. Sarah, Millie and Jon all did a couple of days but all agreed it would have been really, really hard work if it hadn’t been for the brilliant army of volunteer helpers.

Each station was designated a couple of extra hands who once had been briefed on the activity, set about their tasks with enthusiasm, initiative and understanding. They were brilliant!

 

participants display their clay tiles at science festival 2018

mark making in clay at science festivalpublic making clay tiles at cheltenham science festivalclay tiles at cheltenham science festival makershack waiting to be collected

Children sample the potter's wheel at Lakefest Festival Eastnor Herefordshire 2017As the Autumn evenings draw in and thoughts turn to indoor pursuits and activities, here’s a timely reminder of the clay, sun and summer fun we had in August at Lakefest.

We offered drop-in potter’s wheel sessions to festival goers, working with approximately 100 or so families and individuals over the weekend. We also took some lovely pics.Coule display their potter's wheel pots at Lakefest Festival in Herefordshire

Adults try the pottery wheel at Lakefest 2017 Eastnor

collaborative mud sofa at Hay Literature Festival with Eastnor Pottery

Great to be back at the 30th Hay Festival of Literature 2017 in May.

On one of our last outings at the Festival, back in 2008 it rained and rained and rained for the whole duration. We found ourselves working in a foot of muddy water, the consistency of chocolate smoothie, constructing a mud sofa and arm chair with festival goers young and old.

We were delighted to be re-united with quite a few veterans of the 2008 mud bath, including these twin girls who had braved the mire aged just 4 yrs. Here they are then and now!

twin girls return to Hay on Wye Festival to make pottery with jon williams the flying potter

Attaching #clay #leaves to our #hayfestival #trees #forest #hay30 @hayfestival @bbcgetcreative @bbcarts #herefordshire

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We’ve been on the festival circuit of late providing top quality, fun and engaging pottery sessions for guests and visitors at some of the most reputed events in the UK.

At the tail end of May, we spent three busy and enjoyable days at The Hay Festival of literature on the Herefordshire/Wales boarder. One of the global themes at the Festival was ‘Trees’. Graphic designer and kids zone producer Aine Venables produced stunning branding and motifs made up of stylised bows, birds and foliage. This was displayed through-out the festival site and on promotional material and signage.

In discussion with Aine, we proposed a collaborative project where by participants co-create clay trees adorned with hand modeled bugs and forest creatures.

By way of introduction, I threw a pot on the potter’s wheel, the form rapidly turning into a tree trunk before the appreciative audience. The accumulative results looked amazing, especially once we added hazel twigs to simulate the branches. Families and individuals squashed clay leaves to the branches to complete the visual effect.

By the end of our three day residency we had produced no less then x9 collaborative trees with an abundance of woodland creatures peeping out amongst the undergrowth. We love it when participants bring their own interests into the clay modeling and if one scruitenised the collaborative work, you might well encounter the odd t-rex, unicorn and tractor!

A few days later we found ourselves at the Cheltenham Science Festival working with quite literally thousands of children and families all eager to try their hand at clay work. We had been invited to facilitate clay sessions in the MakerShack, a large, interactive space with separate stations and a host of different science related activities for visitors to engage with.

We were situated next to the digital printing stand – pointing up the similarities between ancient clay construction techniques and those of the ultra modern. We encouraged visitors to our stand to make mini coil pots by curling thin rolled snakes of clay around a small paper cone. The digital printers created 3D form  by layering synthetic material. Very similar making techniques – just different tools!

The residency at the Science Festival lasted six days and we helped approx 1000 visitors a day create coiled cones and watch them transform into penguins, flowers and elephants to name but a few project interpretations.