Latest Firing Information
This is the latest info about where your pots may be in the flow of pots through the studio cycle.
Dates of Recent Glaze firings
- January 6, 2024
- March 7, 2024
- April 5, 2024
- May 17, 2004
- June 22, 2004
- July 12, 2024
- August 30, 2024
- October 4, 2024
- October 21, 2024
- November 3, 2024
- December 12, 2024
- December 20, 2024
We send email notifications after every firing. Check this page often. Bookmark it.
Pick up times are during class or during gallery hours.
Gallery Hours: Tuesday through Saturday: Noon-5:00
Morning Classes: Wednesday morning 9:30 -12:30
Evening Classes: Tuesday through Thursday 6:30 – 9:30 p.m.
This page was updated December 19, 2024
Pots from the December 20th firing will be ready to pick up on Saturday, 12/21.
Pots from the most recent firing (Dec. 12th) are upstairs on the white table. Pots from earlier firings and unclaimed bisqueware are by the washing machine, upstairs.
There are no more classes this year, so don’t come in during the evening to get your pots. Come during gallery hours. We have extended gallery hours from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday, during the holiday season. Check our website for up to date hours. We may be closed Christmas through New Years.
These are all the pots leftover from the December 12th firing.
Unclaimed Pots
All bisque ware from last term is by the washing machine or on the white table upstairs. Unclaimed glaze fired pots from previous firings are also by the washing machine. Glaze fired pots from the most recent glaze firing are downstairs. Please claim your work.
Unclaimed Pots / Studio Flow
Unclaimed Bisque Ware: This is an explanation of what happens at the end of every term and where pots go.
At the end of each term, all the bisque ware that was on the shelves in the little alcove by the waxing area is placed on the white table, where it remains for one week, giving returning students an opportunity to claim their pots.
After one week, all the remaining unclaimed bisque ware is moved to the shelves by the washing machine. It will remain up to 8 weeks, unless we run out of room. In that case, the oldest pots, or pots with illegible signatures, or with no class symbol, will be discarded first.
After 8 weeks any pots still unclaimed by the washing machine will be discarded, and the whole cycle begins again. The longer you wait before picking up your pots, the greater the risk of them going missing.
Unclaimed Glazed Ware: Pots from the last glaze firing remain downstairs until the next glaze firing. After we fire again, we need room to unload the glaze kiln so all unclaimed pots downstairs, from the previous firing, are then moved upstairs by the washing machine. As the firing cycles repeat, we eventually run out of room, and then the oldest glaze-fired pots are discarded.
We encourage you to keep track of what you make. You could use a sketch book, journal or photos. Here is a sample of a journal you can print and use.
The Sad End of Some Pots
Our students produce approximately 1500 pots in the course of an 8 week term, and they are all flowing through our studio, from leather hard, to bone dry, to bisque ware, to glazed ware, and finally out of our studio and into your home.
We work very hard to maintain that flow. Students must keep track of what they make, trim it, glaze it, and take it home. We provide information on our website and in class about the studio flow. It is the students job to read, listen and maintain the flow.
Please don’t let your pots end up in our dumpster.
Some Thoughts of Donna's
February 2, 2022
Re: Finding your work and what we are doing to help you…
To all students from Terms F, 2021 and A, 2222:
We have heard from a number of students recently that they couldn’t find their pots after the glaze firing, or sometimes even after bisque firing. This is highly concerning to us and we want you to find your work, see what a great job you did, and take them home to use them. We don’t like it when pots go missing, nor do we like unclaimed pots.
Please take a moment to read through this email to hear what we are doing to help and what you can do to make it easier to find your work. The information below is a short summary of the more detailed information available on our website. Please read the Essential Information page carefully so you are familiar with our policies and procedures.
Signatures
The best way to identify a pot is to have a clear and legible signature and use your class mark. Sharp needle tools on wet clay make a very scratchy and hard to read signature and class mark. See the signs posted near the waxing table showing how to sign properly. Use a blunt pencil or the back end of the needle tool on leather hard clay to sign your work. Use at least your full first or last name. It’s very difficult for us to identify pots that only have initials. Use your class mark and make it clear…some people can make a square that looks like a circle or make such small marks that we can’t count the dots. There is a set of tools affixed to the greenware shelves to facilitate making legible marks.
Organization
We organize bisque-ware according to class meeting time IF THE CLASS SYMBOL is clearly visible. Fragile pieces and mugs are placed on the next-to-bottom shelf. Pots with illegible or no class mark are placed on the floor under the shelves. Be sure to look everywhere for your work.
Glazed ware is sorted by shape and size. Your pot will have shrunk 18% in size from the time you made it until it comes out of the glaze kiln. Be sure you look at pieces that you think might be smaller than yours.
Photograph and Document your work
For your own learning and growth, we highly recommend photographing and documenting all of your work. There are pre-printed forms by the trim wheel in a plastic container and we have the same form available online so you can print these out and make your own notebook at home:
https://www.fireborn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Student_NoteBook.pdf
Knowing what glazes and glaze combinations you used is super important when we are trying to find glazed pots and also super important for you to learn what glazes you like or don’t like.
If you have photographs of your work and then you can’t find the piece, your documentation helps us to help you find your piece. We are posting several photographs in the glaze room of pots that have gone missing. We respectfully ask that if anyone has knowledge of the missing work that they share that information with us. Perhaps you broke something while looking for your own work or inadvertently took someone else’s work home.
Pick-up Times
You can pick up pots ANYTIME during gallery hours or when there is a class in session. These hours are included below our signatures. You do not need special permission to come in…stop by whenever it is convenient.
Breakage and The Graveyards
If something breaks or cracks before the bisque firing, we place it in the graveyard on the white table so the maker knows what has happened to their piece. The graveyard is emptied out periodically, so if you miss a class or two, you might not see your piece.
In the glaze room, there is a graveyard on the white cart near the blue trash can for pieces that break before being loaded into the glaze kiln (sorry, we do sometimes drop or bump pieces) or for pieces that have poor results after the glaze firing. We want the makers to see what has happened and we do not throw broken pieces out immediately. That said, if you don’t come in for several weeks after the glaze firing has occurred, the graveyard might have been cleaned up.
If you do see one of your pieces in the graveyard, examine it to learn what happened and then dispose of it yourself.
The Flow
We fire the bisque kilns weekly, but most work will take two weeks from the day you trim to the day you see it on the bisque-ware shelves. This is because it takes about 7-9 days for the work to dry thoroughly and then another 1-2 days to be fired and for the kiln to be unloaded.
At the end of the term (for weeks 7 and 8), we force dry the work to shorten the cycle to one week so that everyone can glaze before their term ends.
On week one of the new term, all of the bisqueware sitting on the bisque shelves is moved to the white tables to allow room for new work. If you have re-enrolled, please claim your bisqueware and either glaze it or store it in your car or home until you are ready to glaze. Unclaimed pots are then placed on the shelves by the washing machine. Please check this area if your term has ended or you miss the first week of a new term.
Finished ware from the glaze firing is stored on the metal shelves and available for pick-up as soon as the firing is completed and stays there until the next glaze firing occurs. Unclaimed glazed ware is sent upstairs to the shelves by the washing machine.
Emails and Communication
We often get emails inquiring if we have fired the glaze kiln or not. There is a place on our website where you can check to see what the last firing date was:
https://www.fireborn.com/latest-firing-information/
We also send an email to all students in current and recent past terms announcing the glaze firing date and pick-up times. Please make sure our emails are not going into your junk mail; also, keep your eye on the website to see when we have fired.
Please reach out to us at any time to communicate your concerns. Our individual emails are included below our signatures.
Sincerely,
Dan, Donna and Bennett
Donna Hetrick
[email protected]
Dan Vito
[email protected]
Bennett Graves
[email protected]
Studio Phone 412-488-6835
Gallery Hours:
Tuesday through Saturday: 12:00 – 5:00
Morning Classes: |Tuesday and Wednesday 9:30 -12:30
Evenings Classes:
Monday through Thursday 6:30 – 9:30
