Recent Firing

Fired goodies in the kiln

My kiln firing one week ago went well and yielded good results. I was pleased overall with the color and the variation in salt patterns and flame-flashing.

Table of ware from the kiln

Medium jar with faceting

There is always that amusement which comes out of the kiln. This time it was the fact that the pieces below one of the ports where I put the salt in were actually kind of dry-feeling. The faceting jar in the photo below was one such piece. Usually the pieces below the ports are coated in salt and rather shiny, this piece and another one were rather matte.

Another medium jar with faceting.

Good salting on the teapot

Overall, the kiln had an excellent salt coating on everything. I think closing the damper when I salt makes a huge difference in the coating on the pieces.

Twist handle pitcher

                                              

I love the orange peel which covered some of the pieces!

I am still playing with the blue slips. The ones which got a really good salting turned really vivid blue, which is beautiful! The pieces which were closer to the top and may not have gotten quite as much salt turned rather dark and near-black as the other trials have rendered.

Good blues

Excellent blue!

Somewhat black in color, but still blue!

The brown glaze I use for a liner came out of the kiln with a look I had never seen before! It has an illustrious gold flecking through the bottom, and is really quite spectacular!

If you follow Liberty Stoneware on Facebook, you may have seen my update last week when I said the kiln pack at the top of the kiln blew up. After unloading, I found there were no direct hits from the explosion, and it more or less looks like it just crumbled and fell off of the front of the shelf. I made the next firing's cone packs earlier and let them dry out more, so here's to hoping that it goes well!

The next kiln was loaded up yesterday and I finished firing it today. I should be unloading on Thursday just in time for the Fall Festival this coming weekend!