Clay Making at The Waikato Society of Potters in Hamilton

Marcus, Jennifer, Charne & Anna tell all about our recent trip to have a go at some pottery.

On Thursday the 10^th of November we went to the Waikato Society of Potters workshop and we made superheroes out of clay.

The potter gave us each a bit of clay and we then watched her make a clay figure. After that we had a go. Firstly we banged and bashed the clay and rolled it into a sausage, we then cut it in half and moulded the head. After that we cut a line in the middle for legs and smoothed them.  We cut out arms with the other bit of clay, smoothed them and then we scratched them with a fork at the end of the arm. We did the same with the places on the body the arms would go. We then used a toothbrush to wet the parts we scratched and stuck them together. We made a hole in the back to hang them up and we used newspaper to keep the hole from closing (the paper burns away in the kiln). We then did the smaller features like the face and clothes. They turned out awesome.

We also had a turn on the wheel; I think we all enjoyed it heaps! We made bowls, pots and gigantic messes. We had to keep our hands wet so that the clay didn’t stick to our hands. We used our fingers to change the shape of our creations and we also changed the speed to control the clay and so that it would not go all over the place. If you did want to speed up the process you could but be careful! We had a great time and we all wish we could go back again. We have our fingers crossed that they all survived being fired in the kiln.