West Country Potters' Kigbeare Wood Firing 2025

Ash and Earth

Having had my name, along with 50 other West Country Potters Association members', pulled out of a hat was one of the biggest shocks of the year! 

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I signed up for a 25 pot allocation and began prepping and sorting them in March of this year but in true fashion, didn't finish them until the morning they were being taken to the kiln in June. 

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25 pots, 7 different glazes (more on that later), wild clay slip and a four hour round trip to drop the pots off and stack our portion of the kiln and the only thing remaining was the 5 day firing itself. 

GLAZING

This was my first time mixing glazes unsupervised using raw materials with no fail-safe outcomes. I mixed 5 glazes at home: 

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1. Basic Nuka (wood ash instead of straw ash)

2. Rose's Transparent Glaze (Brickfield workshop)

3. Ash glaze with copper oxide

4. Ash glaze

5. Malcom Davis' Shino

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The Shino was what I was most excited about having fallen in love with it in Norway, but the others I was wildly curious about also. Mixing from Linda Bloomfield's glaze book recipes, I was hopefull for strong, stable results but as with any firing, most of all a wood firing, nothing is guaranteed. 

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The WCPA also provided three different glazes for us to use on site: shino, celadon and Tenmoku. I used all three on various pots so my 25 pot selection was actually quite varied in the end. They mostly all went in on the second and third stacks of the kiln but with lots of side stoke holes we were assured that the positioning of pieces wouldn't affect the pots too greatly. 

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The glazing and stacking day saw me come down with an horrendous cold, so I wasn't myself and struggled immensely but it was a lovely day regardless and the people I met there were wonderful. 

FIRING

On July 4th I joined the firing crews up at Kigbeare, set up my tent and learned how this beautiful anagama fires. My shift was 6pm - 10pm and went really smoothly. We gained significant heat to nearly where we wanted without having to rely to heavily on the chimney damper (usually an easy win that you pay for later). 

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It was just myself, Jess Hearn and Gema (@MiaZoiCeramics) with little and often stoking. We switched roles regularly but it was a leisurely pace and we worked really well together. 

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The Saturday saw an increase in temperature and intensity but Sunday was where the pace really hit peak. I started the day at 8.30am after a fitful sleep and was on note-taking, record-keeping, coordinating stokes and general people management in the kiln shed until about 10pm when I had to get some fresh air and a break. It was short lived and I ended up taking over front-stoking and then side stoking until the kiln finally finished firing at 2.30am Monday morning. It was a long sweaty slog and we definitely learned some hard lessons on keeping a rising temperature in Mother (the kiln) and prioritising stoke-holes. 

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The final firing crew was about 9 people in total up until 2.30am, all working tirelessly on the system of stoking and coordinating the wood and timings. I was so grateful to have been able to stay and be a part of the finale. A 4am bedtime hurt a little when my alarm went off at 6.30am to drive back to Cornwall but I wouldn't change it for the world. 

OUTCOMES

We open the kiln on the 18th of July. 

Stay tuned.