Raku Pottery

Little Man and Sweet Pea had the opportunity to do a really cool pottery project in school last year. CC was never able to do it, thanks to Covid, but this is a school tradition that dates back years, and I'm thrilled the twins were able to participate.

A local pottery studio who specializes in Raku pottery came to lead the 4th graders in the process of sculpting, glazing, and firing vases. Raku is an ancient Japanese tradition of firing ceramics by getting them red-hot, then plunging them into a flammable material like sawdust, which creates unpredictable color variations in the glaze.

First, the kids flattened their slabs of clay, and made all kinds of designs with forks, straws, toy gears, stencils, and other random items.

Then they wrapped the slabs around a cylindrical mold, added the base, and smoothed the edges together.

After the vases had several weeks to dry, the kids glazed them. Sweet Pea picked black, which looked like an ugly brown before it was fired. Little Man picked a deep green. The next day, the potters arrived and started some very hot (contained) fires in the school parking lot. One class at a time, the 4th graders went out to watch their vases come out of the fire, glowing hot, and get buried in sawdust. After they'd cooled enough, the kids had to scrape all the ashes off to reveal their transformed vases.

Sweet Pea was super happy with hers. No one else picked the black, because the glaze looked like such a dull brown. But after the firing process, it turned an iridescent black that's really interesting.

Little Man still likes his vase, but it didn't turn green (I suspect he didn't use enough glaze). So his is a matte brownish color. But it's still really neat looking! And I love how they got to learn about and do such a fascinating project.