Whether rightly or wrongly bushcraft can have a masculine, macho feel to it, especially if you also chuck in the miltary and prepper aspect so when I saw a primitive pottery course advertised my first thought was that it was towards the more gentle end of the many disciplines that this hobby can encompass.
It was however a chance to try something that wasn't within my skill set or perhaps even my comfort zone as clay was a medium I last dabbled in at school. I quickly got myself booked onto this day and then waited for, quite literally, several months to pass before the day came.
It was a new course being run by Paul Smith, a largely self-taught instructor who seemed to suddenly appear in the bushcrafty corners of social media (have a look at his 'Who am I?' video on his Youtube channel here) and Dan Aylmer was hosting it on a cool but rain free day at Bushcraft UK Wilderness Living Skills HQ near Basingstoke.
We had to park offsite due to the wettest recorded Febuary ever in the history of the universe which had turned the track and parking area into a bit of a mudfest. If you attend a course here in fairer weather the place is pretty easy to find, if the elements dictate that you have to meet up at the nearby garden centre as we did it is very easy to find too.
As mentioned earlier this was the first pottery course that was being run so I decided to think things through and bring some bits that might help maximise my experience. The first on the list were some fossiled plant stems, I'd seen a potter using a piece of ammonite to add markings to a bowl rim but when I checked my small fossil collection I didn't have a suitable piece so I went with a plan B, the second thing was some tallow I made on an Autumn camp last year with a view to making an oil lamp on the day, some sticky mud from a field near me to ask Paul if it was suitable and a Swiss Army knife just because.
Well sadly the mud I'd brought along was just that, mud...Very clay-like but he showed all of us the difference between my sample and the real thing. I was very childish and turned it into a poo.
Paul started us off with some clay manipulation to get a feel for it, to see how it behaves and to hunt out any impurities before moving onto a simple first project, namely beads. I used the small blade on my penknife to fashion some basic patterning and a pointy hole making stick and whilst I was happy with my efforts it was clear that Paul had done this many times as his looked like he'd carved Oak galls they were that round and smooth.
We then progressed to things like pendants and other such baubles (a tanged arrowhead in my case) and this is where I started to try using the fossils and practiced on a spare piece of clay. They have clear segmented sections but they didn't mark the clay in quite as pronounced way as I'd have liked but I still used it around the pendant's edge. The unintended discovery was that the fossil has a five point star profile and it made a pleasing indent. I made the lanyard hole star shaped and then decided on Nordic runes with "bow" on one side and "fire" on the other (hopefully).
Time seemed to fly by and we soon called a halt to the morning's activities to get cleaned up for dinner. Luckily there was a crystal clear stream flowing on the edge of the basecamp which was useful.
Dan had been busy getting the grub knocked up as we broke and once it was ready we retired to a tarp covered shelter to consume it.
After a leisurely chat over lunch we reconvened to start looking at pinch pots, followed by coil pots after that. I used the pinch pot method to start fashioning my pre-planned oil lamp. It was effectively an elongated pot with a dropped point at one end, perhaps a little on the deep side but I was happy enough with it.
I've included this shot because it kind of shows the vibe of the day. Paul had said it would have a laid back feel and it was indeed the case. Fellow attendees Dom and Russell were well versed in the bushcraft arts (as was Paul of course) so there was a lot of chat, and Paul's wife was a useful person for me to talk to about sewing and stitching.
Also in attendance was freelance instructor Chris Lundgren who has worked with the likes of Coastal Survival and Dyrad Bushcraft. He was on site to deliver a green wood working day on the Sunday and was someone who I'd previously only had fleeting conversations with at shows so it was good to spend some time chatting with him too.
All that said there were also moments of extended silence as we processed and engaged our imaginations as objects were formed.
Predictably as we finished our pinch pots we moved onto the slightly more consuming coil pots. Pinch pots are, as the name suggests, made by 'pinching' and manipulating hole in a ball of clay whereas a coil pot is made by starting with a small thicker walled pot and adding coils of clay to the rim and moulding it.
I made a small coil pot and then decided to make a reciprocal coil lid which I'm pleased to say fits rather well.
So two shots of what I'd managed to make, one featuring the poo and one without. Overall I was really pleased with my output. You can hear Chris asking me a technical turd question in the Youtube video to accompany this blog.
We gathered around the fire and whilst it was technically already lit Paul wanted to demonstrate a primitive way of lighting one. He displayed a very tidy flint and and iron pyrites technique before blowing a tinder bundle into flame.
Paul was going to fire some bits he's got but we didn't have any of our creations considered, why? Any clay creation needs to stand for a week before any firing is attempted so of course that rules new stuff out.
There is a gently does it series of steps when firing and during the process the pieces went from fudge coloured, to black...
...And then almost magically to a terracotta red colour. The process was almost alchemical in the way it happened.
Once cooled Paul kindly gave us all a pendant from the firing, as well as being a momento of the day it will also a good comparison/ guide to the colour our homebound efforts should be. On top of that Chris also generously gave us all a Hazel whistle too.
This was a day that exceeded my expectations and it's always a bonus to have a good crowd to converse with too. Obviously I'll take the tallow home as I need to fire the lamp first of course, fingers crossed that everything will survive my attempt.
Finally, here's the Youtube video to accompany this blog.
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