Hand made extra leafy blue mug with protruding hand sculpted mushrooms deals and beautiful waves inspired glaze, mug, blue mug, mushrooms, fungi

The mug in the pictures is the mug you will receive. I made two at the same time using the same clay and glaze combinations. The other one will on a different listing on Etsy - it is waiting to have a blob of glaze sanded off it's bottom! Apart from the blob and a pair of wobbly bottoms, they both turned out BEAUTIFULLY!
This one is a fat one with extra vine leaves. They take ages to make, which is why it is more expensive. This is a REALLY nice one! I'll be happy to keep it if nobody buys it!
I am a small batch potter who makes a few items a week in my back garden studio, making them after work (I'm an art teacher) and at weekends.

I mostly make blue pottery, inspired by the sea and waves of Dorset's Jurassic Coast where my partner lives. I often go walking along the beaches there - Charmouth, Lyme Regis and Lulworth Cove where I pick up beach glass to add to my glazes and melt into the interior of my vessels. That way people can bring a little bit of the countryside into their houses.

There are a couple of pieces of beach glass melted into each mug.

I hand made the mugs from scratch using white earthenware clay. First I slip cast the basic shape, then after fettling and smoothing it, I added hand sculpted vines and leaves around the handle plus individually made toadstools and grass stems. I am inspired by the woods around Dorset and also Aspley Guise woods where I lived for 15 years and where I often went foraging for mushrooms. Despite the fact that they are inedible, I love the red flyagarics the best (amanita muscaria) because they are so eye catching and linked to the fairy stories I used deals to read as a child. This mug has little red and white and green splotches on the glaze that look as though the forest floor and the dots from the toadstools have spread all over the mug!

After drying, I bisque fired the mug for 24 hours in my kiln, then after cooling, I hand painted it using a variety of high quality blue and turquoise Botz glazes. The mushrooms have three shades of red, plus white dots and the leaves and grass is three coats of yellow and green. There is a wavelike drippy quality to the combination of blues that reflects the summer seas that I am currently seeing with hints of green and white waves and a transparent watery glaze over the top. I also added a gnarly cobbled texture for the crashing waves and melted beach glass plus red and white for the toadstools. The interior glaze is the same as the back of the mug. The base is unglazed.

I think that this mug is gorgeous! Everything turned out perfectly! However, I would use it as a decorative item, rather than as a day to day functioning mug. It is very delicate and the glaze and hand sculpted mushrooms could get damaged if handled on a day to day basis. Not for the dishwasher, microwave or even washing with other pots. I'd carefully wipe it.

This unique hand made mug would make a great present for a fan of walking in the woods or foraging for mushrooms, or a 9th anniversary gift or for a fan of mycology (the study of mushrooms and toadstools).

It will arrive in a lovely box with tissue and re-cycled or sustainable packaging or recycled bubble wrap if I have received any.

Made with love,

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