Why have handmade ceramics become so popular in recent years?

We live in a technology-oriented world with an accelerated pace of life

But today's rejection of complete sets of tableware and vases produced in the same factory

This trend may reflect Our desire to return to something closer to the essence of nature

Small-batch, handmade ceramics are everywhere these days.

You can find them in trend-setting homewares stores like Primary Essentials in Brooklyn and Still House in Manhattan. Considered a symbol of good taste, these ceramics are artistically displayed in shop windows and shelves.

You can also see ceramic products on the style pages of magazines such as "Kinfolk" and "Apartamento". They are often paired with cutting boards that maintain their original shape and bathed in dappled sunlight. Succulents are paired together. This year’s September issue of Vogue even dedicated two pages to the new trend of independent ceramicists.

Among some innovative-thinking Millennials, ceramics have replaced jewelry and furniture made from scrap wood as a new generation of specialty handicrafts, and access to select kilns has become a It’s a new generation of status symbols that people love to show off on Pinterest and Instagram. ? “There’s a beauty in the imperfections [of ceramics], and it feels great to have something truly handmade.”

Fashion designer Steven Alan said. He fills his boutique with a variety of American and Japanese ceramics in textured patterns and neutral colors. ? Bottle and bowl cultivation, lamps equipped with Edison bulbs and dead speed cars were all synonymous with "cool". Now, small-batch, handmade ceramics have suddenly become the hottest decorative items of the moment.

We live in a technology-driven world with an accelerated pace of life. All the trends that have been popular before represent something tangible that can balance our accelerated technological life. Today's rejection of cookie-cutter factory-produced sets of tableware and vases also reflects our desire to return to something closer to the essence of nature.

We want to know where the native chicken and duck eggs we eat come from, we want to know where our coffee beans are grown and roasted, and we also want to know the objects we use to consume them. Containers also hold deeper stories about craftsmanship and creativity.

“People are looking for things that reflect their humanity,” says David Reid. “They are moving away from smooth, flawless steel and looking back at Something warmer," said Reid, an experienced ceramicist and co-founder of a ceramics company in New York called KleinReid.

Recently, interior designer Kelly Wearstler and ceramicist Ben Medansky collaborated on a series of tableware decorated with gold squares. According to Wesler, ceramics can bring a sense of life to a room. "There's something very special about something that's handmade, it has the innate ability to add soul and character to the space it's in," she said.

Robert Sullivan is a contributing editor at Vogue , has written articles about ceramics for magazines. Ceramics are popular now because they are "obviously handmade and they are handmade," he said.

“Ceramics are the antidote to all things electronic,” he adds. Julie Carlson, editor-in-chief of the design website Remodelista, chronicles the rise in popularity of ceramics. “The popularity of ceramics is closely tied to the farm-to-table movement,” she says. “It’s this desire to know the origins of the items in your kitchen that [has made ceramics so popular. ).

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It is very difficult to record and trace their traces," she said of the new potters. "At the beginning, there seemed to be only a few potters, but now the number of potters There are already so many that we cannot report them all or invite them all to our market. ” This is perhaps most obvious in Brooklyn and Queens, where there’s no shortage of pop-up pottery studios, clay shaping classes, and boutiques—just like the homepage of Etsy, the handmade e-commerce platform.

< p> Natalie Weinberger, 29, made the leap from the nonprofit world to the ceramics industry a year ago, becoming a full-time ceramicist with nine other confident professionals. New potters share a basement studio near McCarren Park in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. “There’s a huge demand for people to learn pottery these days,” Weinberg said. , it has become difficult to get a studio. ” She often creates ceramic vessels using textured clay speckled with black volcanic sand, creating vessels with striking, statuesque shapes.

Many New York potters began their careers at Choplet Studio career. Choplet Studio is a pottery studio and ceramics teaching space opened by Nadeige Choplet and her husband in Williamsburg in 2005. “I had four casters when I started. The machine only needs to teach people two or three lessons a week. " said Jopilet, who was born in France. But later, it became a busy clay-making center, with more than 30 clay rolling machines and an additional branch called the Williamsburg Ceramics Center (Williamsburg Ceramics Center). Ceramic Center.

Despite the extra space and expanded schedule, Chopilet said, “We always have a waiting list full of people. Guests waiting for our evening classes. “Demand for ceramics courses has also impacted universities such as the Rhode Island School of Design, which saw an approximately 50% increase in the number of graduates majoring in ceramics this year.

In addition, “we have a lot of students from other departments who want to take ceramics courses, especially from the architecture, industrial design and furniture departments,” said Katie Simey, associate professor and chair of the Department of Ceramics Katy Schimert said, “There are many people waiting to take all the elective courses in our department. ? There is growing evidence that making ceramics is no longer just a hobby, it has become an emerging creative profession - just like handmade chocolate. ? "

I have a lot of people here who happened to open Etsy accounts and then get wholesale production orders,” said Chopilet. “They got their own studios and quit their jobs. There are many such things. ” One of the protagonists of this success story is Forrest Lewinger. The 31-year-old Lewinger now has his own studio, Workaday Handmade, which produces marble-patterned glazed cups, hand-carved geometric shaped clay bowls, and ivory vases dotted with confetti-like blue flecks

His pottery career began in 2012 at the Renegade Craft Fair in Williamsburg. I shared a small stall with others at the Craft Fair. Later, this small stall flourished and attracted a series of wholesale production orders. Barneys New York and the American brand Anthropologie soon followed. Orders were also placed with him.

Today, Lewinger shares a studio with others in Ridgewood, Queens, and employs two part-time employees. He said: “Now that my business has grown so big, I have to hire people to help me to keep it going.

One of the giants in this new ceramics trend is Heath Ceramics in Sausalito, California. Heath Ceramics is to the pottery world what Stumptown is to the coffee world. Brooklyn Brewery to the craft beer world. The company was originally founded in 1948 to sell mid-century modern homewares; in 2003, fellow designers Robin Petravic and Katherine Bailey (Catherine Bailey) The couple bought and relaunched the business

The couple curated a line of tableware, decorative items and tiles in healthy pottery, with a focus on handcrafted pieces. On the one hand, they have introduced some new works and artist collaborations. Along the way, they have transformed Healthy Ceramics from a niche company with sales of only about US$1 million in 2003 to a company with 200 employees and annual sales of up to 100,000 US dollars. $20 million globally. In October this year, the company also received the National Design Award from the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

But the couple says that, like many other budding ceramicists, one of the reasons they were initially drawn to pottery was that it allowed them to oversee the entire design process from start to finish. “One of the great things about clay is that. "The thing is, you can do all the steps yourself, and you don't have to spend a lot of resources to make it," Petrevik said. "You can't buy a furnace to forge metal objects, but clay, a blanking machine or a mold, a kiln Furnaces are relatively easy to obtain. ”

Anyone who has ever made a crooked ceramic ashtray as a child can tell you that the process of seeing malleable clay being transformed into useful ceramic objects with your own hands is empowering. People feel a certain sense of excitement. The difference between this new trend in ceramics and the ceramics you made in the past is that the end user of the ceramic ashtray you made is no longer your aunt who is a heavy smoker. —This time the people using these ashtrays are the buddy who makes your hand-brewed coffee, the chef who searches for ingredients, and the design blogger next door.

(Text/Tim McKeough)

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