3 Reasons Why I Am Throwing 1000 Pieces This Year

Hello friends!

Today is the first day of March and that means we are barreling towards the most magical time of the year…spring! I have so many fun projects and ideas for spring and summer that I can’t wait to share with you, but today I want to tell you about the largest creative project I have ever committed myself to.

In December 2020, I decided to start investing more time into my pottery business, Trish B Pottery. As I brainstormed how I could get more involved, I knew I had to start setting some very clear goals for myself. I am a full-time nurse educator and a part-time studio technician at a local pottery studio. Time, as it is for most people, is quite limited. So without a clear vision, I knew I could get busy and forget my ceramic goals. I also had a few distinct problems that I was trying to find solutions to. This is what led me to the journey of throwing 1000 pottery pieces in a year. In this post, I am going to explain my reasoning for throwing 1000 pieces in a year.

1. I am throwing 1000 pieces to grow in skill as a potter.

I once heard someone say, “Pottery is a process that rewards repetition” and I haven’t stopped repeating it since. I have never heard a truer statement about pottery. A big thing people do not realize is how difficult the craft of pottery is and how much time it takes to get even the slightest the hang of it. Even when you start to gain some skill, you are still just seeing the tip of the iceberg. There is so much to do and see in the pottery world, but the basic steps must be the constant focus.

In my humble opinion, and through my observations as a clay educator, getting better at pottery is a meticulous act of breaking down the process over and over again. Once you learn the steps of throwing a piece on the wheel, you then start to analyze each part of the process even further to gain more understanding. This helps you grow in skill over time. My guess is that this is a process that never really ends. You just keep getting better all the time…but you have to give yourself time (more on this polarizing topic in another blog post soon).

Throwing a ton of pieces forces you to stay in an experimental place. You will get very bored if you do the same shapes over and over. I am naturally drawn to experimentation with pottery, but a large volume will keep me chasing after newer and more challenging forms.

By throwing 1000 pieces, I will have the focused repetition that I will need to grow in skill. To meet this goal of 1000 pieces, I have to throw 20 pieces a week. It keeps me from wandering off to find other exciting things that will keep me from my goals. I have only been doing this project for 10 weeks, but I already feel like my technique has improved. I can’t wait to see where I am in December.

2. I am throwing 1000 pieces to have inventory for new opportunities

In the past few years, I have gotten so many sweet messages inviting me to participate in craft and art shows. If you are a maker, you know that a lot of these come at the last minute. I am someone who loves to say yes to opportunities, but I would never have enough stock to be able to join or enough time to make enough pieces where I could actually fill up a table. I would have to say no each time and I was always bummed.

My Etsy shop is another place that I would love to have more consistency with this year. I made the realization last year that things that are not listed on Etsy…don’t sell. Obvious, right? I was bored during lockdown and found that I had three or four adorable planters I had made before I got furloughed from the studio just sitting on a shelf with zero plans for them. I put them on Etsy and that day I sold all of them. I thought to myself, “What on earth am I waiting for?” People want to support makers and artists, but we need to do the work to get the product in front of them. Listing items can seriously make you want to pull your hair out, but the more I do it, the easier it gets. I am learning all the time about the business side of making and I know that will help me tremendously in the future.

3. I am throwing 1000 pieces to appreciate the creative process

I think this may be the most important reason. I want to stay engaged with my creative flow. If you are not actively planning and giving yourself time to create then life will take over and that time will be gone. I have begun calendar blocking my time this year and I try to make sure I have set aside time to be creative multiple times a week. Am I always in the headspace where I want to create? No way, but every week where I am intentional about time for creativity is a week that I unearth new things.

As John Muir once said, “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” While he was undoubtedly speaking about being outside, the part of this quote that resonates with me the most lately is “places to play in.” I am highly experimental with clay and love to try the next shape, the next glaze, the next tool. It is so delightful, and it really does feel like play. I think to unlock higher levels of creativity, we need to be able to play. Throwing 1000 pots sounds pretty regimented, but the goal invites me to come play more often than I ever have.

Pink pottery forever.

I hope you follow along for more about my journey to throw 1000 pieces this year. At this point, I am 10 weeks in and have thrown 236 pieces. I am ahead which is wonderful and I want to keep up that trend. I took this last week off because I needed it and I am thankful I was not falling behind.

I do get the question a lot about what my parameters are. I do not keep all 1000 pots. My rule is that if I throw the piece to the point where I am pulling the walls up, it counts as a piece whether or not it makes it off the wheel. That is the easiest way to count and also keeps me from filling my entire house with pottery.

I am doing this project from 12/23/2020 to 12/23/2021. I will be providing more (and shorter) updates here as I move through the year. Thank you for reading! Stay muddy, friends!