Intermediate Throwing Skills

Two week "Dip in" Intermediate Skills Courses

If you have mastered the “fundamentals” skills of throwing you hopefully want to get better!

These ‘dip in’ intermediate sessions are two consecutive weeks on the wheel ( Fridays 6-8.30), each focussing on a different throwing skill or decorating technique. There will be demos and explanations, with time for you to make, trim and decorate your pieces.

If you want to keep your pieces, you will come back in a third week (leaving enough time for your drying and bisc firing) to glaze. If you don’t want to keep it, that’s fine too!

(If you want to come to the sessions, but continue to work on a previous week's pieces, that is fine too!)

When

Intermediate “dip in” courses run for two weeks on Friday Evenings, 6-8.30pm.

Book the first date, and it’s that Friday and the next one. You can schedule a series and keep coming!

We will work to a planned schedule. With most of the thrown piece shapes, we’ll also cover carving when leather hard.

Throwing & Trimming Bigger Bowls 18 & 25 Sept / 8 &15 Jan
Throwing Lids & Closed Forms 2 & 9 Oct / 22 & 29 Jan
Decorating with Slip: swirly, dots, scraffito & more 16 & 23 Oct / 5&12 Feb
Throwing & Trimming Plates 6 &13 Nov / 19 & 26 Feb
Throwing Taller: Bottles and Narrow Necks 20 & 27 Nov / 5 & 12 March
Throwing Porcelain: inlayed colours & mishima 4 & 11 Dec / 19 & 26th March

Bigger Bowls

18 & 25 September 2026 / 8 &15 January 2027

The same fundamental techniques apply to bigger bowls as to smaller bowls - centre, throw a cylinder, then stretch to a bowl.

We’ll gradually work up from the size you are used to throwing to bigger pieces of clay, and pay attention to those tricksy problems of not getting the top too thin, smoothing the inside ‘shoulder’ and supporting the wall when stretching.

Bigger bowls usually benefit from a thicker base which is then trimmed into an elegant foot, so we’ll recap that as well.

With a bigger bowl you might like to carve texture or other interest.

Lids and Closed Forms

2 & 9 October 2026 / 22 & 29 January 2027

Pieces with lids are very useful! We’ll cover the three methods of making lids:

straight pot and lid with lip (the easiest!)
pot with gallery
closed form

Decorating with Slip

16 & 23 October 2026 / 5 &12 February 2027

Using slip - both natural and coloured - is a great way to elevate your pieces. You can be subtle, or you can be bold! There are lots of techniques!

Using slip for texture you can create swirls dots and lines on your pieces - which can be organic with movement, or measured and precise.

Using coloured slip you can write or draw squiggles, or you can make block patterns.

And with scraffito you can carve through coloured slip to make patterns.

Plates

6 &13 November 2026 / 19 & 26 February 2027

Superficially easy, plates are one of the hardest forms to master. Even if you take what looks good off the wheel, they have the highest failure rate when firing - in terms of cracking and warping. So a bit of skill and patience is needed.

We’ll cover the two main ways to make plates on the wheel ( stretching with your fist or a rolling pin), then compressing and lifting the rim.

Throwing Taller : Bottles and narrow necks

20 & 27 November 2026 / 5 & 12 March 2027

When you can throw taller you can make a bigger range of jugs, vases & bottles.

The same techniques apply as with throwing any cylinder - well centred clay, stable hands, and hugging and compressing your piece as you pull it taller. So this is primarily a recap of the fundamental skills.

Or you can cheat and achieve height attaching different pieces together! This opens a whole new world of possibilities with interesting shapes and forms.

Porcelain

4 & 11 December 2026 / 19 & 26 March 2027

Porcelain is a beautiful material, but annoyingly difficult to throw! For this class you need to be confident in throwing normal clay.

The beauty of porcelain is its white colour and semi-translucent nature. Covering that with glaze seems a bit of a shame, so we’ll approach porcelain by throwing with inlay colours and mishima. The outside of the piece is left unglazed - although the inside can be glazed if you want it waterproof.