MAKING VASES

Well, second post, and I'm already a day behind. As they say here: "That's Maui"- a different pace of life. Anyway, my Ikebena vases have not been selling well, so I thought I'd try some different sizes and shapes- small table vases for individual stems (which get quite large here in Hawaii). Made a few round ones, then started playing with the extruded necks. And then I got tired of things always being round (my mentor and friend Tam Irving calls it "the tyranny of the wheel"), so I started paddling the bases to change the shape. Still a bit too regular; the next batch I want to change to freer facets- and then extrude a neck to fit. Well, we'll see. Also threw a bunch of tea bowls, mostly to test some glazes on surfaces larger than a test tile.
On a different note- made a fruit salad with all homegrown fruit: papaya, pineapple, passion fruit and banana. The pineapple was out of this world- tastes like perfume. And easy to grow here: just root the cut-off top in a beautiful tenmoku container- when it has roots plant it and wait two years. Bananas just keep growing; to get papayas just throw out the seed and wit for the tree to bear fruit, and passion fruit grows wild. Probably not a balanced diet, but I'm not complaining.

about 8"

About 9" stoneware

About 9" tall stoneware

Creating more pineapples