Article: Meet the Maker: Lil Ceramics
Meet the Maker: Lil Ceramics
This Christmas, we're excited to introduce our candle collaboration with Lily from Lil Ceramics. Creating a special, locally made Christmas candle has become an A&C tradition, from the vessel and signature scents to working with our candle makers and packaging everything in-house. We love a true co-lab and the love that goes into each candle.
Lily has been a practising artist for more than two decades, working across photography, cement and sculpture before finding clay. We love the beautiful pieces she creates, from tableware to bespoke pieces for some of the country’s best restaurants, alongside running workshops from her studio.
What we love about Lily’s world is how open it is. She shares her studio and the process from start to finish with real warmth and humour. It felt like exactly the right fit for a candle made to be lit at the centre of the table, with everyone around it.
We caught up with Lily to talk about her process, our co-lab and what Christmas looks like at her place.
1. Tell us a little about you and Lil Ceramics. You worked with photography, cement and sculpture for years before clay - what was it about clay that made you stay?
Starting with an art background, that always leaned toward making with my hands, I knew this was how I liked to express myself. Having children made me pause my practice for a while and focus my creative energy into their world - cooking and sewing and building a home. But after I had my third child, and with #3 baby in tow, I started working with ceramics, learning from mentors and artists and before long I was totally hooked! it married my creativity with practicality in a way and was so delightfully tactile and adaptable. After filling my home, and overloading everyone I know with ceramic gifts I started thinking on a larger scale and eventually bought my first kiln. With this, I could have more control over firing my work… this opened up lots of opportunities and led into what we have today.
2. You make such a wide range of pieces, from everyday tableware to really special bespoke work. What do you love most about making with clay?
I love how a simple piece of mud can turn into such a wide range of objects and forms. With so many techniques and processes to learn It’s a medium in which, if you want to, you can continue the learning journey indefinitely. Every culture in the world has used clay and ceramics in one form or another from utilitarian pieces to amazing works of art. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of it.
3. We love getting a glimpse into your world on Instagram, the studio, the process, and the people who make it all possible. Tell us about what a day in the studio looks like.
Kid #3 is 12 years old, so my day usually starts with wrangling him off to school before getting myself and our dog out for some exercise and fresh air. Then it’s off to the studio.
The first thing I usually do is check the kiln and make sure it has fired correctly overnight. Once it’s below 200 degrees, we open it up and let things cool down so it can be unloaded later in the day. We fire the kiln to about 1220 degrees Celsius (cone 6), so it’s still pretty hot when we open it.
We’re making things daily, so I always need to check the pieces made the day before to see if they’re ready for trimming. They need to be leather hard but not too dry. It’s a daily practice to keep everything moving at the right pace, and how quickly things dry and can move to the next stage depends a lot on the weather and humidity.
By this point, Holly, who helps with orders and keeps the online stock up to date, has usually arrived. We’ll pack up any orders and restock the online store with items that have come out of the kiln. We’ll then plan what needs to be made that day, and we’re all off with busy hands.
Richard and I will be throwing on the wheel, while Laura, Stef and Holly are often here to help with unloading the kilns, sanding, glazing, rolling out slabs and shaping pieces for our everyday tableware collection. We try to squeeze in a sit-down morning tea or coffee and lots of good chats.
Every day, we unload and reload the kilns to be fired overnight. Each firing takes about 48 hours before we can open the kiln door, and we alternate kilns so there’s a steady stream of work being completed every day.
Every piece we make starts as a ball of clay that needs to be weighed and wedged (kneaded). It’s then either thrown on the wheel or rolled into a slab, shaped into its form and dried. Next, it’s trimmed or smoothed to take away the rough edges and finalise the shape, then dried again for anywhere up to a few weeks.
It’s then bisque fired to 950 degrees and, when it cools down, it gets sanded, waxed, glazed and glaze fired to 1220 degrees, then sanded again. I think there are at least 18 steps before we even get to photographing, packing and shipping.
At least once or twice a week, someone from one of our restaurants, homeware shops or a collab artist will pop in to throw ideas around and plan something exciting to keep us busy and inspired.
It’s been super exciting to have an artist from LA come and stay for the last few weeks and work on projects with me!
4. You are one of the busiest studios we know and work on so many exciting projects. Is there a piece or project that has been your favourite?
Every time I get the chance to eat an amazing meal off one of my plates is pretty special. Seeing that simple utilitarian object go from my studio to becoming the foundation of that delicious meal… mmm m m.
I’m always balancing production time with creative time and it feels like a bit of a treat allowing myself to be experimental and make pieces that are a bit more of a risk or be one of a kind. I’m currently enjoying working on a series of large coiled vases so you’ll always find a few about the studio in different stages of completion.
5. Tell us about the design process for the A&C Christmas Candle?
We wanted to keep the vessel minimal and unfussy but still have some presence on the table, so we folded over the rim to create a bit of space around the candle and differentiate it from a simple cup, also focusing on a design that would be useful for all sorts of things after the candle has burnt.
We chose a rich toasty smooth clay which works well with our two chosen glazes to give a soft satin finish. We chose the deep earthy kelp green glaze for the Christmas pine and the crisp white glaze for the Orange and cinnamon.
6. This year we have two scents, Christmas Pine and Orange and Cinnamon. What does Christmas look and smell like at your place, the table, the tree, the whole feeling of the day?
Always a real Christmas tree, the smell is so good and brings back all my childhood Christmas memories spent at my grandparents. We usually stagger a few Christmas celebrations over three days to enjoy time with the extended family.
Christmas day itself is often at home, with an early start checking the Santa stacks, a big late lunch extending through to the evening with shared cooking and everyone bringing their signature dish. My mums is a raspberry trifle, Gramps usually a side of salmon. I do cocktails and the bbq is always on and busy. Come the evening we roll away from the table for a Christmas movie and early enough night to wake up straight into packing for camping the next day.
7. One of the things we love about the candle is that the vessel lives on long after it’s burned. How do you imagine this being used, and is that something you think about while you're making?
As I was thinking about the design of the vessel a big part of this was its use after the candle has burned down. I think it would make a great planter pot for herbs or hold-all for pens and pencils etc, it would even make a cute bowl for overnight oats or chia puddings, really the uses are endless.
8. After more than 20 years of creating, what are you still curious about? Is there something you’d love to explore or make that you haven’t yet?
There’s a whole world of making I’ve barely scratched the surface of and I look forward to exploring when the time comes. Every country has its own variation and history of ceramics, I’d love to travel more and learn about the history, traditions and techniques that are unique to each country.
I’d like to experiment with more alternative firing methods like wood kilns, raku, pit firings etc and hopefully in my soon to be new studio I’ll have a chance to build some experimental kilns and try some of these techniques.
FILL IN THE BLANKS
A Christmas tradition you never skip…. Mimosas w breakfast & walk on the beach.
Your go-to studio soundtrack… The Appleshed playlist, a shared playlist that probably contains mostly my ex assistant, Megs music but every one in the studio can add to it and subtract - so it’s a pretty eclectic ever-evolving collection.
A favourite maker or creative account to follow… Where would I start - there are so many inspiring artists who share information so generously.
Janine page pottery - who has done so much research into using NZ materials in glazes and clay bodies
https://www.instagram.com/janeen.page.pottery?dlrf=d3M5eWJiOGY3bWs1
Richard Naylor - friend and mentor, always generous with his time and expertise
https://www.instagram.com/richard_naylor?exln=MWJtYXViNTc2bDVzaQ==
Zoe McBride Rings - Studio mate and general all round amazing human who inspires and pushes me every day.
https://www.instagram.com/zoemcbriderings?srtk=MTcybWs2YnhxcTBjbQ==
The most inspiring place you've been… Korea. The ceramic world of Korea and specifically the residency programs with Kwak Kyung Tae, who was so generous with his knowledge and his food and soju!
Something you always have in the studio… Chocolate and clay. Stored separately
Your perfect Christmas day.. Sun shining no time pressure and a walk on the beach while someone else is doing the cooking.
