From Porcelain to Pickles
The studio has been quiet since May.
Here is where I went...
After moving away in 2020, I moved back to Detroit in June. Most of my hours since have gone to my partner's company called NYLA, which makes sparkling pickle juice in Detroit. Ahem, I mean 'our company'. I think I've earned that.
I quickly became our creative director, among many other hats/things. I've spent time thinking about brine the way I used to think about glaze.
I did not expect the two to have much to say to each other.
Porcelain is clay, water, fire and time. You can't hurry the drying. You can't open the kiln early to see how it's going. Everything you did carefully on Monday arrives all at once on Thursday, and by then there is nothing that can be done about it.
Brine is dill, cucumber, water, salt and vinegar. Five things, in proportions that do not forgive being approximate. It can't be hurried either. It also tells you nothing at all until it's finished and you can taste it.
A brine is a glaze recipe with a different clock.
So it has not been a departure so much as the same discipline in another material. It has been good! It has also taken every hour I have, and the kiln has been cold since spring.
Which brings me to why I am writing...
There are so many pieces here. Finished, tucked away, waiting. Made to be worn and they're sitting in a cupboard in Detroit instead, while my hands are somewhere else. That is the wrong place for them. (Yes! I moved back to Detroit.)
So, they are going out at 30% and 50% off, and I would rather be straightforward about why than dress it up. This is not a seasonal sale. It's what happens when a studio goes quiet and the work is still sitting there. I would rather these pieces were on people, always.
Some of them will come back. Those are the Essentials, and they are 30% off. Forms I would make again, when I make again.
Some of them will not. The Archive is now 50% off. When those are gone they are gone. So consider them rare and unique.
GRAMMAR is not closing. I'm just not making right now. I won't give you a date, because I don't have one and I'd rather not invent one for the sake of a tidier ending. But the list stays open. When I am making again, you will hear it here first.
Thank you for being here for the quiet part.
Sarah
Essentials · 30% off The Archive · 50% off
NYLA is at nylajuice.com, if you want to see it. It looks nothing like this.