Pot Building Process

Willow Bonsai Pots - South Africa

By Antony & Mavourneen Smith

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Antony and Mavourneen make pot by a variety of techniques. One of them is their 10 step process, as detailed below:

​All moulds are handmade by myself and refined to give the best smoothest casting. 
1. Pots are cast using slip into our moulds
2. Pots are slow dried for integrity
3. All pots are sanded level top and bottom using a building level
4. Pots are then worked off by hand by Mavourneen or in the case of the bulk pots by our team of 2 guys.
5. Each pot is then sponged to remove tool marks and refine any details of the pot
6. Each pot is packed into our kiln for the first firing to 900c bisque
7. Once unpacked from the kilns each pot is prepped for glazing. We paint all areas of the pot that should not be glazed.
8. Each pot is dipped in our unique reactive glazes
9. Each pot is cleaned and excess glaze removed from waxed areas.
10. Pots get fired for the 2nd and last time to 1260c for high reaction of our glazes and vitrification.

Each pot is inspected for quality and if it passes the quality checks, a Willow Bonsai sticker is applied to the best front of the pot. This is up to individual opinion and is only a guide.

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The ‘European Bonsai Potter Collective’ is brought to you by Alex Rudd and over 50 of Europe's leading bonsai ceramists and furniture makers.  
Willow Bonsai - S. Africa is an honorary EBPC member artist.
​The EBPC are proud to be Willow Bonsai's distributor for Europe & works will regularly be available for sale in the EBPC Shop.