The Potters

 I thought clay must feel happy in the good potter's hand.

~ Janet Fitch, from White Oleander  

I have visited potters and potteries since the first trip to Ireland.* I have mailed, packed, and carried home quite a few pieces of pottery.**

In 2014 we stumbled into the International Potters' meeting in Dublin (still breathe fast when I remember).*** We were there for an entirely different purpose, but I haunted the exhibits for days - until we left Dublin for the west.

On this trip three potteries turned up while we doing other things. Of course we took note.

We stopped at the pottery in Gort (after eating on the dinnerware for days).**** Micheal Kennedy, the potter came out and visited a minute. The work is sturdy and busily decorated. DH loved that his soup was always warm to the end in one of these bowls. I assured him I would make him soup bowls as I realized I would never be able to fit the Gort bowls into the luggage for the trip home or in the cabinet at the house. They will have to be the size of our "every day" bowls. [Check out the website, this pottery is lovely, but it was just not "our thing." It might be yours.]

It is a lovely plate.

We looked in the window of the pottery shop in Corofin. We were there to catch the bus for a guided hike in the Burren National Park. It was Sunday. The shop was closed. I thought I had a photo, but I cannot seem to find it. The pottery was simple. Yes, it spoke. "Pick me up," it said. My mind's eye sees blue and white ware. [A search of the Internet provides little but a few lines about Yvonne, the potter, before a list of Pinterest and FB sites.] <sigh> A visit is on the list for the next trip.

I saved my favorite for last:

"I'm a bad potter," said I. "We are all bad potters," Seamus replied.

Early on in the adventure our tour stopped in Roundstone to see a different craftsman (the bodhrán maker) and for a lunch break. Roundstone is a small fishing village in Galway.

On the grounds of an old Franciscan friary is a tiny pottery. Séamus Laffan, the potter, was in. His wheel was just behind the counter. He smiled when I said I was a bad potter and he allowed me to look behind the counter at his kilns and the work drying.

I only came away with a vase and cup. But we will go back again.

Séamus and his wife, Rosemarie O’Toole, are both artists. She decorates much of his porcelain work and makes jewelry as well as work on tile and paper.

The clay is happy there.



[It should also be noted that merchants will often arrange to mail your purchases home. But postage is quite dear. And I am a girl who still likes to carry things back.]

Note the wheel just behind the counter.

Ah, order!

Jewelry

The bowls are calling me. I love the cleverly decorated mugs as well.  Note the line of small vases waiting for a wildflower or two.

NOTES:

*It all goes back to that first Western Stoneware jug I found in my grandmother's garage in Victoria, Texas. I can still feel the crunch of the cinders/gravel under my feet as I walked over and picked up the brown and white jug with blue stenciled decorations. I was not young - probably a teenager. I have been in love with pottery - especially stoneware - ever since.

My first Irish potter was Louis Mulcahy on Dingle. It was just a small place in 1977, but is quite a going concern all these years later. I think I only visited in '77, but was able to buy a small piece on our honeymoon in 1981. I still have that first small vase. I think it must have been a "second" as we were church mice. We had just graduated and had no jobs - just a promise of one. What were we thinking?

**It was another honeymoon purchase. We found a giant whisky jug - Jameson. Yes, I still have it - along with many others crocks and jugs. I don't think they let you hold a giant whiskey jug in your lap on international flights these days, but you can buy a bottle or two in the duty free store.

***http://walkinthepark-padimus.blogspot.com/2014/09/walking-streets-of-dublin-little-irish.html

****http://www.michaelkennedyceramics.ie/ Our favorite restaurant - The Gallery Cafe served many of the meals on Kennedy's work.

*****http://www.dccoi.ie/directory/clients/member/22720