Kiln unloading September 2025

On a side note, I just wanted to show you this amazing flower which is... Oh no! It's very delicate. Look at that. Amazing. It's a dahlia of some type. If anybody knows, let me know. Hi, this is Vaughan at westcotewellpottery.ca in Nova Scotia, Canada. I'm packing a glaze kiln and I've been doing some glaze experiments with dots and dashes and slip trail lines using tenmiku gold, variegated blue, and oatmeal with matte turquoise on the bottom. So I've made a whole bunch of these different ways of slip trailing the color and we're going to see how these melt and how they look at the end of the video. I also tried using... I think this is matte turquoise. No, it's actually chun green which is a Chinese oil glaze and I did the same variegated blue and oatmeal over the top of the chun green with the same dots, dashes, and various other ways to see how the glaze is going to melt together and probably we'll get some runs out of these which might be quite interesting. So the kiln is packed, ready to go. Turn it on tonight for a pre-heat and then I'll turn it up properly tomorrow morning. I probably will never grease those hinges because it's kind of like my signature tune now. Okay, well I tried something a little different. I put tenmiku gold on the top because it's been working really good on the bottom but I'd noticed in previous variants they didn't work so well on the top and I thought well I'll give it a really good try this time and make sure it stays in oxidation. So I did and it looks like it worked. So it's probable that in my previous firings I kind of let it get too far into the neutral zone of a gas if you got oxidation neutral and then reduction and I think for efficiency I was always letting it get up to you know some neutral firing kind of conditions and this time I really liked in that previous firing when I did these. That's why I did some more because they've been selling and so some nice little tea bowls. This one actually went kind of dull so this one kind of looked like they did in the previous firings. So what it is is the oatmeal is great but the very giddy blue just sort of goes dull and that's got iron in it so I think the iron tends to dull the actual blue but it's still a nice bowl. This is not what I was hoping for and it didn't run so it's very flat on the glaze because I glazed the bottoms of my pieces kind of thing and so I think that is a nice bowl but the the gold is just over intense. Really lots of flecks. These are my... that one did run and this is my handmade stilts. I'm gonna have to pull that out with pliers and these are handmade stilts and they're lasting really well. I did it with paper clay and all that and it works well but I will have to grind that one but it's because I piled on the very giddy blue and oatmeal with a slip trailer and so we always get the great effect but you end up with the running a little bit to grind off which doesn't matter too much but pull the stilt off and then you can reinsert it so your stilt is still good if it can get it to go back in hopefully. Is that the way it was? No I think it was the other way. Yeah there you go. So my stilt is fine but paper clay it's a little fragile because I've dropped these and they break whereas normally they wouldn't but it's a nice use of that clay so that one just needs to have that dribbles ground off. That one down there dribbled next to that one with these same glazes and it didn't dribble because I didn't slip trail as much but you can see where I'm doing the slip trailing. The blue needs to be a little bit more intense I think and that's probably this far. It'll be interesting when I do this in the electric kilns not too far off because it's starting to chill down a little bit. I stopped packing this kiln sometime in late October. Same mug thing with lots of slip trailing and it ran and dribbled a little bit again. There's another one of these that didn't run. This time I'll try pulling it off without grabbing the uh yeah cut it off without pulling it out of the stilt so that was good. So just this will take about 5-10 seconds to grind off. This one ran a lot more and it's ruined my stilt but it's amazing on the inside. Look at that that's amazing really beautiful but I'm gonna have to really grind this one. This one didn't stick to the stilt and that had a lot of diagonal slip trailing lines on it and you can see you don't really see the diagonals but because it runs so much that these three glazes always do a lot of running and they've still got a little bit to grind off under the handle there. I didn't slip trail on the handle though that's pretty amazing but um we are getting the usual runs with tempered gold. It's a glaze that you love but you know you're gonna have some runs. This one didn't run. The stilt is actually should come off easily there's a little look at that's flat it's not too bad so it doesn't have the great runs on the inside like the other bowl did though. The oatmeal I'm gonna have to thin down a little bit I think I just mentioned it makes a new batch too so it's a little thick at the moment I guess. Everyone had the handle running I'm just gonna Very interesting since I slip trail the body not the handle and yet the handle is where the runs are so it means that all that stuff on the handle is what's running down and gathering around the bottom of the handle and it runs off. You wouldn't think there'd be that much glaze on a handle to run down but that's always where it is so but we've got some really nice effects and they have been selling. I'm adding an extra five minutes probably to each mug by doing the slip trailing so that's adding four dollars to each mug for the extra work on them and to make it interesting I tried a different glaze using this process of slip trailing the variegated blue and oatmeal and this glaze is chun green and it actually looks really nice. The oatmeal doesn't show up as much the variegated blue does. I'll give you a close-up it's quite nice and you've got the chattering with chun green which shows up so much better than the tenderco gold and we don't have any runs on the bottom because this isn't tenderco gold this one's really sweet really excellent chattering. The chattering tools of course are from artisanpotterytools.com very sweet and the glaze didn't run very much on that one where I did the dots. I expected them to run down like it does with the tenderco gold but the iron in the tenderco gold is fluxing that whole glaze combination so much that it runs a lot and that's what's nice oh look this mug has a friend this is a refire from a previous firing where I found that the matte turquoise had blistered a little bit in the top areas on some of them and so I refired them and this one has a little buddy it's trying to grow a new mug but it's like a plant growing a tuber but the refire worked look how it ran down you've got this real bubble there but it didn't cross the line unlike some things that are happening these days that are definitely crossing the lines but I went back to doing the contrast on the front of the building I have loads of the yellow and purple and bright green fish left over and I don't have many of the dull ones so I thought am I selling dull colors so I thought I'll make some more dull ones and we'll see whether these continue to sell out well outsell the yellow and green and purple ones but this is a really nice combination and I did a lot of them so this is my bronze glaze and metallic bronze with apple green and bright blue very good blue oatmeal and I think that was it and I'll use some total white but yeah we're gonna have a nice experiment here so it seems like this mic is working last time I put it on it just went dead during the middle I was talking so I've charged it up we'll see whether it lasts now and a car just went by let's see did you hear it okay another one in the slightly more muted duller colors same oh matte turquoise is in there as well so apple green matte turquoise bright blue variegated blue and focalt white it looks like I decided to add a bit more yellow to some of them there goes another car going by but anyway we'll see when I listen to this it was the audio was very quiet too so I'm not sure what to do about that but hopefully you can hear he's solemn faced but he's in a joyful position anyway there's my cone on the top so we'll look bottom top I'd say we've got pretty perfect firing there this is back to the happy fish I had a few left over that I had glazed um previously and so that's where the yellow came from because there's no purple in these so it's not quite as bright one of the new ones but I put a yellow face on him anyway but these are the more solemn color ones I remember doing I need a bit of yellow in them some of them look that's a nice one this is one of the newer ones where I put some yellow in again with the bronze the proper bronze glaze which always works so nice it's in cone six glazes not John Hesselberth's but the other book on cone six glazes that lesson it's not food safe we can only use it on decorative pieces here's a color combo that I don't do very often at all he's got folk art white thin and doesn't that look good I'll be doing that again and there's some more folk art white the textures are getting a little bit more interesting because I bought a whole bunch more texture rollers another one with a lot of motion I spent yesterday making a large group of whales again people go whale watching right here we've about you know 10 miles from here there's a Lunenberg harbor and people go out looking well so and they they're out there here a lot so people always get to see them breaching and uh so it's why the whales outsell the fish he's a little happier though doesn't have the purple but it's uh muted down I think without the purple they're a little nicer although they're so bright when the purple gets on that and the folk art white is great I'm gonna do that again for sure yeah bronze into the copper copper bronze into the folk art white there bled a little bit but it's kind of nice that was a big truck that just went by it's very noisy so I'm hoping you don't hearing it on this mic there's some copper bronze in the body there too and I think I have a couple of whales in here I basically um charge um the same amount of money for the whales as I do for the fish based on size um and these outsell the fish completely and the fish take longer to make so um this is the last shell for a while of the fish and whales and then I'll go screw some of these onto the wall outside because we've had two really busy days in the shop so people are still out here on on holiday yeah I think the folk art white is a winner here it gives a good bit of contrast to the whole piece nice texture on that one okay some more tundreen with the variegated blue and oatmeal it's funny chemical gold gets so blended and the other glaze because even this one didn't do what I expected it and get much more kind of melded together that one's a little nicer see the oatmeal on this one I felt I don't know it just kind of um looks too white almost I mean this one is a bit better because it's blending with the variegated blue so I think I have to do the variegated blue and then do the slick clearing over the top of that now we have a one of my better sellers in the gallery these noodle bowls sell out all the time people often buy four at a time there we go so there's four this time they're different sizes in this little batch though I like to kind of match them in size a little bit at least there we go this one's a nice one I like to do the cranberry a little bit in the pieces but not too much because I find it a bit overpowering but that one I think just had the right amount because it fades in and out and gives a little chrome tin pink to the actual oatmeal that's actually oatmeal where it's gone for a perfectly pink and that's because of the cranberry has chrome in it two more of these because I know I did four that were the same size but they're getting still pretty easy to get them off those refires I think I just dipped apple green over the top of the entire area that had those twister bubbles in them and it got rid of it and it actually ran a lot there's another one of those baby babies trying to come off but um it's like a an extra thing to grip on because it catches your finger just there where you hold it this one did run a little bit I gotta grind that one I'll just tiny bit on that one I was dipping right the way to the bottom to cover up the blister bubbles so I guess that was naturally that would run because it was glazed right to the bottom these are the mugs that I usually send when people say they have a coffee pot they want this is the size I use I kind of think people need because I don't know the height but I think these are like three and three quarter inches tall and this is the chun green with the chattering effect so there'll be a lid to fit this somewhere in here yep there you go that's a little sugar jar these sold out during the summer too so I made a bunch of them some more refires wow look at that I'm not sure what I think about that and it did almost fit it there too I don't know the green is definitely nice green but it's blended with whatever glazes were underneath which I can't remember it looks nice on the other side too okay so we're back to some tenmiku gold and this one didn't run this is a real nice one even though I don't see the lids I'll show you when I get them out the chun green is such a stable glaze I can wipe it right to the bottom and it doesn't actually run down any further and it shows chattering through so it's a beautiful glaze I might try that as my dark blue next time adding cobalt to it to see whether I can get a nicer blue oh look at the inside it's really pretty and the lid's mixed up these ones are the correct lids now there are little spoons I have wooden spoons that go inside these which I just found on I think it was amazon and there is the apple green it tends to go really glossier in this firing I'm surprised with that because it's usually not quite as deep and glossy now here is my hold it properly here's my dark blue and it has a few pinholes in there that's why I'm thinking of trying a different glaze base with my dark blue I'll use the chun green base and that cobalt and see if I get a better dark blue and go I wish I hadn't done that but the dark blue it's a nice enough blue but it just sent the variegated blue will slip on this glaze and just slide down and off the piece sometimes so I'm using bright blue and a bit of oatmeal on these these ones but I still don't like the fact that every so often you get no reason at all you get these pinholes got some kale fillers this little shape when I have a spare piece of clay I just make a little kale filler a few more fish and here's one of the really old ones that I had laying around for a long time so it still had the purple they're nice I mean but I just have a lot left over on the display so I'm thinking that maybe they're not as nice as I thought they were but just bright and people may be feeling they don't want bright these are a couple of jackies which she tends to put in frames as well oh one of our cats they're very nice we'll pick we'll make little pottery ceramic frames um two more kiln fillers for me any scrap of clay that you can make a little slab out of and put it over the front mold this is very 60s this one must be left over from the previous backer glazing because I used to still have the purple I definitely didn't use purple in the last there you go that one's very nice actually the purple was just enough two more little kiln fillers these things are just nice I think twelve dollars or something just to get something quick that somebody can buy as a instant purchase this one was a quick let me try it that way another quick one that I just dipped both sides yes well it's grumpy mr grumpy it's got the yellow and the purple on it so it's an older glaze one sometimes I'll have pieces sitting around ready to go in the kiln for three or four weeks because I just don't have enough especially this sucker takes a lot of pieces to fill this kiln so um so I work on that schedule two weeks making pieces then pack a kiln um this fire and then I actually make pieces for another week and then while those pieces are being fired I'll be glazing the first firing and so it's a long cycle five weeks maybe to get around to starting ordering and popping the ink but that is a nice fish it's got three more fish and then it's back to pots this is more long one there you go this will fill up my wall on the front of the building which is a good batch of fish so here's an older glazed one in the bright happy fish color big time run so the 10-2 gold in this firing was much more vulnerable to running and whenever it runs it really does nice colors but I've got to figure out how to maybe I'm just not going to glaze I'll dip them like that just to the halfway mark and then just won't I'll glaze you know matte turquoise in the lower half so they don't do that running because that's not salvageable really I can grind it off but it's a lot of work of grinding on that one little 10-2 jar really pretty but it didn't run that's nice I'm going to be lucky to get any 10-2s that don't run here so I'll have a little grinding to do on the cover the lids are spectacular interesting that the variegated blue faded out on the it's actually the 10-2 gold that's running I had no but no oatmeal and no variegated blue on these at all it was just 10-2 gold and it did run so look at the signature how it comes out when you use the black underglaze people ask what that is it's just uh I remember lug1 I think or lug10 underglaze here's the bright blue the well actually it's dark blue with bright blue and variegated blue over it this is what I experimented with the bright blue and dotting variegated blue and oatmeal dots all over the whole bowl and these are just two regular bowls I had these thrown in a video electric company's been setting we're smelling smoke today the forest fires they say it's now contained uh but 85 square kilometers inside big and I've had a headache two mornings when I woke up because of the smoke around here is the dark blue this one may have had variegated blue and oatmeal instead of bright blue oatmeal because it has slipped the glaze seems to release from the edges and slide down using this glaze that's why I'm because the chun is perfect so it doesn't affect it too much by adding a different oxide this was a re-fire using my yellow because something happened I think it just crawled on the rim and I glazed thick blue on the rim to see if it would work by scraping the edge of my bright blue bucket of glaze so that sludge that builds up I'm just palette knifing it on the edge all the way around so it would stay and then you know re-fire and it worked because the glaze when you just dip it is so runny and this is got glass it's already glass so nothing sticks to it if you use that sludge you can actually just paste it on matte turquoise with cranberry variegated blue and oatmeal and purple variegated blue and oatmeal and where the oatmeal is the purple makes it go pink that's a nice combination you can see on the back to where it goes pink that's the white oatmeal it goes pink because the chrome can't it's another re-fire because I had a blowout which I think is something out of my cog mill in the recycled clay I only use the recycled clay now for making fish and whales matte turquoise variegated blue and oatmeal with a little bit of cranberry on the edge there okay we have another bunch of nice little bowls that's the dull apple green which is maybe I think people will like that but it's definitely not doesn't pop off your shelf or anything so this one I did some slip trailing with colors I think I must have just done lines coming up from the center outwards and like I did green and cranberry purple with variegated blue and oatmeal here it's a nice basic little bowl a nice surprise surprise this one ran a little bit so I have a little bit of grinding but not much on that one so I am going to thin my tender to go down a lot because it definitely is running too much there are a couple of matte turquoise variegated blue and oatmeal little sugar jars another matte turquoise sugar jar not the chattering on me and a dark blue one with the I think that bright blue and not variegated blue which is why it's held in place just some plain blue one with some variegated blue and oatmeal and another plain blue one a couple of more purple ones if I can get you to see a bit better the chattering shows up really well I can't turn slightly but you can see the chattering on the bottom and on the lid areas and this one ten meku gold didn't run I think it's due to the thickness so I'm going to have to be thinning it down a little bit and I probably will just dip it for in and out without counting at all these are from a previous glaze period and they don't need re-firing whereas then those re-fired ones were from the same firing same glaze cycle I did with these so these are fine oh this is really nice just enough glazing on this one to give you the run and I have little grinding to do there but it's not bad and then somebody just emailed me about these that happened on the other piece too this is a re-fire it kind of I won't say anything nice mug these are shun green with variegated blue and oatmeal on top and then bright blue underneath dark blue variegated blue oatmeal and bright blue underneath bright blue and oatmeal over dark blue and then matte surface we don't have any of the blistering that I found that I do when I actually buy those mugs but these are all turning out perfect same glaze it's shun green and bright blue dark blue variegated blue and oatmeal see the dark blue has worked really well on these so it's possible the pinholes that come with it are just where it gets a little bit too hot and the gas scale of course is slightly uneven although my firing is very even oh that one ran I'll have some grinding I'll have to wear my mask and do some grinding there you go nice mug that's a standard I do that a lot this is very nice that's the kiln uh complete um mostly success but there's some grinding to do on some pieces and I lost one piece out of the whole firing um which I don't think is worth grinding at all I might do it again um but but I've got enough work to do another glaze firing so thanks for watching you