The Emma Bridgewater Pottery

Today I went with a friend to the Emma Bridgewater Factory in Stoke on Trent …we had a really interesting factory tour given by a lady who had worked in the pottery for years. She explained each process really well and we spoke to some of the workers. We visited each stage of the process from the liquid clay through to the skilled decorating. We were interested to see that cut sponges( made by hand in the factory by a special team)  are used to decorate with the various patterns designed by Emma B.   Her husband ( now divorced but they still work together) is a different type of artist and he has designed all the realistic dog, bird prints etc which are put on by a type of transfer. 

The factory tour was followed by a session for us to decorate a plate using a variety of sponges and colours. This was more difficult than we thought and took longer. However we managed to produce something reasonable which will now be glazed, fired and sent to us by post in a couple of weeks. ( see extra).

After this we had a very nice afternoon tea in the cafe and a browse in the seconds shop and the shop with new products and Christmas items. Her pottery is really expensive,  even the seconds , but I did buy a couple of things.

This outing was a present from my daughter so it was a lovely thought and much appreciated.

Now watching the news and the fact that HS2 has been cancelled!