Okay---Those mos' def look awesome & amayzeen! That said---how do you protect them from Catts? But yeah--Furry beasts seem to have a tendency to de-shelve fragile stuff.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosarugosa
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Okay---Those mos' def look awesome & amayzeen! That said---how do you protect them from Catts? But yeah--Furry beasts seem to have a tendency to de-shelve fragile stuff.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosarugosa
Museum wax.Quote:
Originally Posted by littlebittybobby
Museum Wax! But yeah--why didn't I thinka that?Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
It's supposed to hold up in earthquakes, but I don't think it's been tested by catts. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by littlebittybobby
I am a big fan of museum putty, but more to protect things from us. Our current two cats are not very destructive thankfully, although we do need to protect our food from Louie.
Here are a couple of pictures of recently completed stuff:
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rosa, your pottery pieces are so lovely! Thank you for sharing with us.
Really pretty Rosa!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by rosarugosa
I know you aren’t doing this pottery gig for money, but I’m going to offer unsolicited comments about commercial viability that you should, of course, completely ignore! Ha ha.
I peruse Etsy and Pinterest for certain kinds of ceramics. I am a buyer of ceramics. Currently I’m buying the popular form of small planters for succulents.
https://www.succulent-pottery.com/
I can’t get the pieces I want from this potter. All of her charming little pots in the 4 to 5 inch range sell for $58 and they’re all sold out. She makes trays which are not sold out.
I see tons of mugs on Etsy and I don’t want mugs. Actually, most ceramics on Etsy are not very interesting. I did buy a very small succulent pot for $40 plus C? I’ll spend the money and there’s something interesting to buy.
So my advice to you is think about making small planters for succulents. Everyone is buying succulents These days. I think your pretty glazing technique would work well for those forms.
Thanks, IL. That is actually useful input. DH has already sold a lot of mugs; everyone seems to want mugs for some reason. I'm a bit mystified by that because I thought most people had too many mugs in their lives.
I have a succulent planter that is a work in progress. It's not too pretty because it isn't glazed yet. I liked the more whimsical aspects of the ones in the link you posted, but here it is, and I'll share another picture when it's complete:
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I think these were a bit more quirky and whimsical. A woman in our class made a larger one with the painted plant impressions and it was quite wonderful.
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I would buy the fiddlehead fern one... my son/DIL have a fiddle head fern garden and he'd love it. if you are selling it at at the craft fair, I'll buy it--PM me if you are interested in selling.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosarugosa
Thanks, Catherine, but I hung that one up in my gazebo just the other day. I love working with ferns though, and I'm sure I'll do some others and I will let you know.
IL's post inspired me, and I hand-built this one today. It was done with a textured rolling pin, not actual plant impressions. I think I'll play around with these some more because they are fun. There are some things I would do differently next time, but I was in a hurry to get this one done before class began. Of course it isn't glazed or anything yet.
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I love that shape!
I recently finished up and planted this succulent garden. It was a class project and we used the teacher's template, but chose our own colors and texture designs, embellishments, etc. (I did not make the little owl. I bought him a long time ago, and he just seemed to fit into this miniature garden quite nicely).
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Then there is all this stuff that DH and I brought home about a week ago:
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Love the little garden!
I’m sorry to piggyback on your thread about pots you make, but I thought you might be interested in seeing my collection of small hand built pots acquired in the past 12 months.
The one in the last photo is super Duper cool and very expensive. It has so many finishes, and they all work together beautifully, it fascinates me. I’m trying out different plants in it. I wanted something soft and free flowing, not some stiff little succulent plant for it.
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IL: I am delighted to have you on my thread! I've actually been playing around with succulent planters since you mentioned them, because I really like projects that combine my love of plants with pottery.
The first picture is one I made from red clay, which is easier to work with for hand building, but the glaze treatment isn't too exciting. The next 3 pictures are of one I did with white clay. I really like how the surface decoration came out (especially the bug), but the pot is a bit wonky. The white clay is a bit more difficult to work with for hand building projects. So I haven't hit it quite right yet, but it's fun to play around:
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Very nice, rr. I really like the third one.
Thanks, Happy. The second, third and fourth pics are different sides of the same pot.
Yesterday was our first real attempt at selling some pottery. It was an interesting experience in a lot of ways. It was a local, low-end "Crafts Fair and Flea Market," and a low-risk, low-reward proposition. The table only cost $30., so it seemed like a good opportunity to try the waters. Our net earnings were $181 dollars after the table fee, so I'm glad we're not trying to support ourselves with this. Our stuff was priced very low, so I'm kind of surprised we didn't do better, but the event seemed more flea market/yard sale oriented. I do think we did better than a lot of the other craft sellers. Some observations:
It was more fun and less tedious than I expected. I actually enjoyed talking to the people who visited our table, much to my surprise.
We got a lot of positive comments on how beautiful our stuff was and several people mentioned that they liked our color choices.
A lot of women middle-aged and up commented on how they loved our stuff but already had too much stuff at home to buy more.
Some of our better sales were people buying gifts for others.
The attendance at the event wasn't huge, so more traffic would have probably generated more sales.
My biggest takeaways were that we would probably do better at a fair that's a little more crafty and less flea-markety, and timed closer to the holidays when people tend to be more in gift buying mode. It would also be more worth our while to do a venue with more traffic. I think we did pretty well with the aesthetics of our display for a first-time effort. My biggest regret is that we went there with 10 boxes of pottery and came home with 9! If anyone has input or constructive criticism, feel free to offer it. I think we would like to do a couple of these a year to help keep our inventory under control.
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PS: As far as prices go, we had 4 or 5 pieces for $25, and everything else was less than that. We had an "oops box" of $1.00 stuff that did very well. Most of our items were between $5.00 - $15.00.
Glad to hear that, overall, it was a success! I think your assessments are pretty much spot-on.
I wish you would have been able to get rid of more than one box, but making close to a couple hundred dollars seems fine. Was this a two day affair? i’m glad it wasn’t tedious for you to sit there for a day or two.
I’m going to the big St. Louis art fair in a few weeks and will be looking at ceramics, prints, and paintings.
RR, your stuff is beautiful! Sounds like a fun day at the sales. I like chatting with customers, and miss that with being in malls. Just a couple random thoughts from our years of street antique shows - table skirting or full length cloths are very helpful. Ups the professional look, covers the boxes of stuff you stash under them. large plain sheets can help with this, since actual skirting is time-consuming. Your crate idea as backdrop is great! Since most of your stuff, naturally, is similar in height, it's good to figure out ways to elevate items and create a look that's not just a table full of dishes, if that makes sense. What draws you into a booth or stall? Ask your friends what draws them in. Play around with display ideas - always thinking about wind, which can be a huge issues with breakable stuff! Try grouping by color, or type - how does that look to you? Also - some pots of flowers, herbs, succulents setting in some of your containers will add some pop. You can sell them with the planter at a higher price, or you can just say that the plants are display only and move them from dish to pot as stuff sells. Anyway, just some thoughts that may, or may not, work for you :) have fun selling! You can't keep creating if you don't move some inventory, right?
IL - love the pots you have. And love the begonia. I bought a couple this spring to plant outside and ended up keeping them in. Love them! Don't know if I can get them to winter over, I only have one good window and in the fall my ferns come back in to reside there, so I don't know.... and in December, they all get moved to the basement under light so the tree can come in for the holidays. It doesn't help that all house plants have to be inaccessible to our salad-loving cats. >:(
Early M, I am learning about begonias. So far I am finding them to be thirsty little water hogs. I have a new sun room and for the first time can successfully have houseplants, they get loads of sun. I even had snake plant putting out flowers and I have never seen that.
Thanks for the input, Early. This venue was pretty flea-marketlike, so we probably did have the most professional looking display there, but I can see where a more polished display would be even more important in a different setting. I did think about putting plants in a couple of the planters, so maybe I will give that a try next time.
I have been falling in love with begonias this year. I will have to take and post some pictures. They are toxic to cats and Raymond sometimes nibbles at my houseplants, so I will probably just let them die at the end of the season, but that makes me quite sad.
I know they’re toxic to cats so yell at my cat when he gets into the plants. I have one cat who likes to mess around with plants. The other cat, our tiny princess, has no interest in plants.
IL: This yelling at your cat strategy - do you find it to be effective? Such has not been my experience.
mine, either. our current crop of cats seem impervious to yells, unless they are the ones yelling. both are very fond of greens in all forms and keeping the plants out of cat-reach really limits our ability to house flora of all types.
Ha ha well, he stops chewing on plants when I’m in the room with him and yell at him to stop. Sometimes I have to get out of my chair and snap my fingers at him.Quote:
Originally Posted by rosarugosa
As for other bad cat behaviors, no amount of yelling will keep our tiny female cat from jumping up kitchen counters, so I do not even try.
I took pictures of these succulent planters to show you guys, but then I don't think I ever posted them:
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Those are very nice, rr!
Those are cute, I’d like their shape.
RR, Those are cute. Will you need to bring them in for the winter?
So pretty!! The shape looks like they would give them added stability, too.
Yes, they would have to come in for the winter.Quote:
Originally Posted by nswef
Here's the latest. The pumpkin collection is work from both of us. We tried different glaze treatment on different clay colors (red or white clay).
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Oh my gosh, those pumpkins are darling! You’ll sell a lot of those, they are charming!
My mom used to collect these flower pocket things that looked like your sconce. I really like that one!
So cute! I love the pumpkins but I also love the dragonfly mugs!
Such beautiful work! I like the mugs as well.
Lovely! the pumpkins are especially adorable!
These little trees came out so cute, and they were fun and easy to make. The mushrooms were also fun to make, but glazing was tedious and didn't come out quite the way I wanted.
We have a table at a church craft fair this coming Saturday, and I wish I could get a bunch more trees made, but it isn't physically possible. On the one hand, it would have been good to learn the tree project during the summer, so we could make them for the holidays without a time crunch. On the other hand, if the teacher had xmas trees on the syllabus in July, nobody would have been pissing and moaning more loudly about it than yours truly! At least I can get an early start for next year.
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