Ceramic Bottle Tool Prep

Series Summary

Ceramics are art works made out of clay bodies that harden with the application of heat. Originating in Chinese, Cretan, Greek, Roman and Mayan cultures, ceramics have a long history that dates back to the third millennium B.C. Pottery was used to create food and water jars, decorative bowls, sacred urns and religious idols. Potters most traditionally use their hands, but several tools exist to aid the ceramic making process, including the potter's wheel. Ceramics range from functional vessels to decorative sculptures and remain both a long-loved craft as well as a fine art. Ceramic spouted bottles are perfect gifts for a cooking enthusiast. In this free ceramics video series, a master potter demonstrates how to create handmade ceramic bottles with spouts that can hold cooking oils and sauces. Learn how to prepare clay for the potter's wheel, how to throw spouts off of a mound of clay, and how to throw two different bottle shapes. Find out techniques for attaching spouts and handles, as well as how to assess the shape of the piece as a whole. Practice pottery wheel techniques and create unique gifts by making these ceramic spouted bottles.

Video Transcript

"Alright, so with this we're going to want out two sponges, our needle tool; this little guy because I'm going to use it as a throwing stick to make a spouts for my bottles that we're going to make and we got everything right there. So basically this is going to be another piece that's going to be thrown off the hump so what I'm going to do is I'm going to get my clay and I'm going to get a pretty decent sized chunk; prep, yeah we're only going to make a couple bottles so that's cool. If I was going to sit down and make a whole bunch of bottles I'd take all this clay and put it on there but we're just going to do two. Alright so at this point we got out slab; just a chunk, it's got tons of air bubbles in it; we're going to wedge this and then get it on the wheel head."