WE’RE FIRING THE SALTY DOG THIS WEEKEND!
Loading the kiln Friday the 18th, and firing from the morning of the 19th to the evening of the 20th! Please join and support the effort with food and drinks to pass.

Kiln Update:
Monday I adobe late into the night, all of my helpers shifted throughout the day until eventually they had all dropped away and pretty soon it was 4 am and I was freezing and loosing my mind to the rhythm of patting the caustic mud, my hands still haven’t recovered. Yesterday evening Chris Sneed and I drove out Ken Shenstone’s pottery paradise in Albion, MI to join and finish the tail end of his noborigama firing in which we both had pots, we also left with another load of his famous super ultra duty omniwedgeular 12 pound bricks. Today I unloaded those, and headed it out to John Glick’s home and studio to take a load of soft bricks out of his shed in trade for cleaning his shed, what a guy! This evening we had our last class of this 6 week session of pottery class at Vanguard CDC, we glazed a wall tile mural together that will be amidst the flames within the Salty Dog this weekend. We also loaded the last bisque this evening, we’re planning to glaze that tomorrow evening, tomorrow is going to be a huge day. Okay, back to work.

things left to do:

-prep kiln shelves and stilts
-make wood wadding and kiln wash
-make doors for primary and secondary stoke holes
-resolve the fire box grate
-finish chimney and insulate it as it passes though the roof
-finish glazing
-more wood
-load
-fire

 HOPE TO SEE YOU THIS WEEKEND! :)

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Back in Detroit and back in action! The Salty Dog was successfully funded on kickstarter.com! Thank you so much to all of you who so generously pledged your support, soon enough your rewards will be on the cusp of lava! I fixed the brick saw and it is cutting bricks once again, and I successfully found the kiln admits all of the weeds. Six weeks of wilderness tried it’s hardest to retake what it believed I had abandoned, it believed incorrectly. It was soothing to think that maybe New York wouldn’t take quite as long to recover from as I had thought. I’ve been learned, charged up, and jaded by my summer’s travels and experiences, I’ve recovered from my 21st birthday and The Salty Dog’s days of unfinishedness are numbered. I’ve been in talks with the Vanguard Community Development Corporation (based in Detroit’s North End neighborhood (across the street) they offer among many things, art classes for the youth of our neighborhood) and I’ve submitted my proposed class plan/schedual/idea that will end with the kids getting to firing some of their work in The Salty Dog, lets hope that works out. School’s about to start and this weekend is prime stacking time, Sooooo expect to see an explosion of blog post’s and kiln progression as we attempt to build the domes in the near future! :)

Salty reguards,
-Henry C

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WE’VE REACHED OUR MINIMUM FUNDRAISING GOAL ON KICKSTARTER.COM!

Thank you so much to everyone who has helped support “The Salty Dog” and everything that is to come from it, your generous and enthusiastic donations are destine to make and prolong the kiln and it’s future. I do also what everyone to know that it is a minimum goal, and that every extra dollar will only improve aspects and possibilities of this project to be something more than just an awesome and reincarnated  kiln. And so, please continue to do what ever it is your doing because it’s working really well. :)

Thank you all again and again,

-Henry Crissman

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So as the countdown to my departure nears it’s end all my many technical issues that have been making me crazy seem to be resolving them selfs. Wednesday morning, before heading to the College for Creative Studies Mrs. Molly Beaureguard brought her aspireing artist daughter to out place to check out the kiln, have coffee, and join for the CCS wood firing. She also lent me a nice camera to use on my seven week adventure to Haystack Mountain School of Craft and then to New York City for an internship at Greenwich House Pottery. Thanks Molly, I hope I don’t break it!

The College for Creative Studies wood firing yesterday went really well, so many great pots were packed in so tightly and Tom Phardel brought a bonsai of his to appease the fire gods. The fire men showed up despite our calling them and informing them about the day’s firing. They couldn’t understand why anyone might willingly have anything to do with fire if it were not an attempt to put it out. It’s concerning when I think about the future and their perception of “The Salty Dog”, but this is why our neighborhood must be involved and supportive of the project. It’s hard to know how to convey what your doing when some people are so unreceptive, I’m not worried about it, it just reminds me how much we have to stress the local connections we’re trying to make.  We should be unloading the work tomorrow afternoon and I will photograph them and post the results tomorrow evening if time allows before my departure.

As far as “The Salty Dog” is conserned, the brick saw is still out of order, so, no progress has been made on the it’s construction sense our attempt to lay in the center arch between the two chambers when the drive belt gave out on us. But progress has been made in other places, my Aunt Susan E-mailed me this afternoon, she takes classes with a close friend who has a studio and an old kiln they’re ready to deconstruct, and she has offered us the bricks. We are cirtainly in need of more bricks and I’ve had a few offers, we’re working on following up on them, we’re just trying to figure out what we need and how we’ll get them. I may have to purchase a truck in September when I return so we can make this happen.

I’m going to miss you Detroit, You’ve been quite beautiful this summer.

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Currently hanging out in the wood kiln waiting for the fire!

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a little handbuilt cup :)

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Ceremonial cup, It’s in the salt kiln right now :D finished photos soon! 

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Some pots from the first firing in our amazing wood kiln! :)

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12 cups fired in 4 sets of three. 

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