How we got started, what we beleive in, and our long term goals
Hiya! Thanks for joining us here! Now What?! Pottery Works consists of two primary members, husband and wife team Nick Orozco and Lela Blyler, plus some occasional guest artists. We love creating one of a kind, handmade ceramic goodies, made to be both beautiful and functional. Alongside creating, we both have a huge passion for educating! We feel like pottery can often be a very gatekept craft, which can scare people away from trying, or make it harder to make the things of your dreams. We believe in the open source mentality, so here in our blog pages, you are going to find things like our glaze recipes, and testing, kiln designs and builds, how to guides with video and pictures, and hopefully, lots of answers to questions!
Now for a little background info on us, and how we learned what we know!
Nick and Lela met in college in 2013, while we were attending Humboldt State University. We quickly ended up in multiple ceramic classes together, and became fast friends. While in college, we were able to experiment with pretty much every part of the ceramic process, from making clay bodies, to a huge variety of throwing and forming processes, making and applying glazes, and loading and firing kilns. Both of us were eventually employed as studio techs, responsible for keeping the studio clean and functional, and as glaze techs, helping to keep the wide range of cone 10 glazes mixed for the studio, and as kiln techs, responsible for loading and firing the students bisques and glaze kilns. Nick spend 6 years attending classes at HSU, and working in both the ceramic and sculpture labs, as he has a background in blacksmithing, something that led to him helping build a kiln for the studio, Lela spent 5 years at HSU, graduating in 2017 with a double major in Studio Art and Art History, focusing on the ceramic art history of Korea, and the French Rococo. Now What?! Pottery Works formed in early 2016, before Lela and Nick started dating, and quickly evolved to be the main focus as soon as we graduated.
Nick and Lela in December of 2016 at their gallery opening for their Now What?! Pottery works show
After college, we spent 2 years living in Redding, California, slowly making work out of a tiny falling apart laundry room studio. It was freezing in the winter, and so hot in the summer, but it was amazing to have a space of our own to make. Lela spent most of her time running the shop, and figuring out how to run a small business. We had a tiny gas kiln on the covered carport, and pretty much only mugs made sense to fire in it, so we made mugs! It was a challenge to go from a fully outfitted studio to a tiny room, but we made it work.
Pictures of our first small home studio. It was so beat up, but we made some beautiful pots here!
After struggling along in Redding, in January of 2019 we moved to Hillsboro, Oregon, and began searching for a studio to make work in. We also set up a tiny studio in the dining area of the apartment we were renting, and made it work. Lela started cold emailing studios to see if any of them were hiring, or if they had a gas kiln and space we could rent to work in.
By March, we found Radius Art Studio, and got lucky that they were hiring a glaze tech right when the emails were all sent out. Lela was hired to maintain their cone 6 glazes, and they had a gas kiln that hardly anyone fired. She set to work learning all about cone 6 glazes, testing them, and making sure the studio glazes all functioned the way they were supposed to. Alongside that Nick began working for a high temperature technical ceramics manufacturer, and dove into understanding technical ceramics and furnaces.
We got married in May of 2019, and dove headfirst into creating community and developing our business in this new area, started doing in person markets, and figuring out what it meant to make and sell on a larger scale. We also started thinking about teaching, and what we wanted that to look like.
Of course, then Covid happened in January of 2020. We continued to work our respective jobs, but teaching in person seemed off the table for a little while, so we began exploring making videos. Lela discoved she likes filming, and even editing videos, but struggled to find a way for long form content to accomplish what she wanted, so it eventually took a back seat to short form content when Lela started a Tiktok, and began posting about her art, and making educational videos.
Teaching came back onto the table in 2021 as Radius also was able to have us teach our first cone 10 reduction class, all about firing manual gas kilns. We did a few of these at the old Radius location, and made things we had never made before! Watering cans, lampshades, new glazes! We began putting together a bunch of cone 10 glazes to try to provide a cone 10 reduction firing for the local Portland community to have access to, since it didn't really exist here before. Eventually, Radius needed to move locations, and Korin ( Radius' owner) asked us if we could move and rebuild the kiln at the new Radius location. The building took a very long time, as we were only really able to work weekends, but after about 9 months, Shirley, the rebuilt and redesigned kiln was finished. Lela also became an instructor at Radius, teaching 12 week classes for Radius in 2022. Teaching has been, and continues to be an incredible joy. Lela and Nick front the cone 10 program at the studio, firing about every 6 weeks, and teaching students all about reduction firing. Our firings are open to the general public, and anyone with cone 10 clay can buy space!
All the while we were making content for TikTok, and growing a wonderful community of artists and art lovers, who have been incredibly supportive of Now What?! Pottery Works. We were also collaborating with other fellow artists, and now you can often find our pots with our friends' decorations painted on them.
Currently, Lela still teaches 12 week classes and other workshops at Radius Art Studio, including glaze mixing, glaze application, and even a teapot intensive. She goes live on Tiktok nearly every Wednesday, and you can tune in and ask your questions about pottery there! Nick is employed as a maintenance tech for a local ceramic tile factory, and teaches the cone 10 firing workshop, with more workshops to come!
Thanks so much for joining us, we adore our community, and can't wait to learn with you, and explore more pottery things!
Nick and Lela ( plus the pottery cats Lucie and Eva, and the rat princesses Daisy, Peach and Rosalina.)
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