ceramics - Page 8 of 9 - Peter Arscott

Springing Open in April

April 10th, 2017/in Blog, Latest News /by Peter Arscott

Pasque roses in Spring

Everything is blooming in this part of the world, the sap is rising, winter’s greys are turning into varied shades of green, and cherry and apple blossom are everywhere. April is a month when things turn for the better, it even gets its name from the Latin word “to open”, describing flowers opening at springtime, though Aphrodite the goddess may also be another root for the word. Did you know that April used to be the second month of the year until January and February were invented by the Romans? No, nor did we.

Nor did we know that “April” was the 250th most common name for a baby girl in the UK, or that in the UK it is National Pet Month, or that in the US it is National Pecan Month. And our meticulous research has unearthed the following:

Zebra crossings were introduced in Britain on 4 April 1949, when James Callaghan, then parliamentary secretary to the ministry of transport in the British government, came up with ‘zebra’ as a name for the crossing which it was thought would be easily understood and remembered, particularly by vulnerable groups such as children.

Russian cosmonaut day is April 12, commemorating the astronaut Yuri Gagarin who became the first man in space on April 12, 1961 aboard Vostok 1. He spent 108 minutes in space.

And when, we hear you ask, is National Eggs Benedict Day? Why, it is on April 16th, a day to enjoy eggs with hollandaise sauce, crispy bacon and English muffins. Apparently, a lot of people have never had Eggs Benedict, but we reckon belatrovians are sophisticated and most likely to have enjoyed Eggs Benedict a number of times, and perhaps, on a regular basis. See how many of your friends can tell you how its made, or what’s in it. Or, ask them what hollandaise sauce is.
Celebrate by eating Eggs Benedict – click here to see how to make them (first get a hen).

belatrova corner planter

All of this is just a preamble to let you know that we are holding our annual Spring Open Weekend on Saturday 22nd and Sunday 23rd April (10 – 5pm) at the Bankside Studios. You are most welcome to drop in and browse, and even though Eggs Benedict will not be on the menu, we will offer you tea, coffee and cake.

c’est ne pas un chevre

You would be hard pressed to find a spot anywhere that both makes and sells the variety of goods you can find at the Bankside Studios in Ledbury. You can step into the studio to see Fleen Doran, fresh from her successful show at the British Craft Trade Fair at Harrogate, making her salt glaze pots at the wheel, while Wendy Houghton works away at her delicate ceramic sculptures. This is the same workshop where belatrova produce ceramic planters, fruit bowls, mirrors and birdbaths next to the joinery section where Stuart Houghton busily shapes and cuts wood to perfection – at the moment he is whittling a small goat out of myrtle. Upstairs Dan Barker has his photography studio, shared with the textile designer Sunny Todd, and across the road can be found artist blacksmith Dave Preston hammering iron on his anvil – in fine contrast to Bob Evans who can be found in his studio opposite printing images of striking quality on very new and sophisticated printers.

handmade ceramic flower pot with handles

striped splash pot by belatrova

The studios are situated just behind Alfa-Tech on Little Marcle Rd, which is accessed via either Lower Rd or New St. Please follow the signs. There is limited parking on-site (and wheelchair access) and there is additional on-street parking.

large wall mirror with blue frame

The address is: Bankside Industrial Estate, Little Marcle Rd, Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 2DR. And do please visit the Ledbury Cooperative’s website: https://www.ledburycollective.com/

For those of you who live in or close enough to London we would encourage you to visit the Cecilia Colman Gallery in St John’s Wood. It is right on the High Street and easily reached by underground. Glass is a speciality but among the many excellent pieces on show, ceramics, paintings and jewelry also have pride of place. The gallery is showing some belatrova pieces, including three legged bowls, wave fruit bowls and a large wall mirror.

Cecilia Colman Gallery

We’ll leave you with part of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poem Spring:

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring –
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

hello Spring

March 3rd, 2017/in Blog, Latest News /by Peter Arscott

painterly close-up

You haven’t heard from us for a while, we admit, but we are coming out of our Winter torpor, just like the snowdrops that every year nose their way out into the light before Spring to gladden the hearts of all lovers of beauty and Nature. And we are here to gladden your homes and gardens, with our handmade ceramic lamps and outdoor tables, our fabulous mirrors and the new range of Jazz pots influenced by our old friend Thelonious Monk and others.

blue and yellow

With your gardens in mind, we’ve been making new Brushstroke Blues planters that will bring to life any corner of a garden or patio, and, because they are mostly blue in colour, they will set off the warmer yellow, orange or ochre hues of the plants. Furthermore, blue is serene and mentally calming, associated with intelligence, communication, trust, efficiency, serenity, duty, logic, coolness, reflection, calm, and thus a nice contrast with yellow and its optimism, confidence, self-esteem, extroversion, emotional strength, friendliness and creativity. All of that in one planter, but then belatrova does like to carry out as much research as possible on behalf of its supporters and customers, and this often reveals things we were not aware of – perse, smalt and watchet, for example, are all associated with blue, as are the better known azure, cobalt, navy, sapphire, cerulean, cyaneous, mazarine, pavonated, perwinkle and ultramarine.

watchet

smalt

perse

In all honesty, blue is belatrova’s favourite colour – as you may remember from a previous blog (July 2014).

ceramic blue abstract table top

Click here and you can hear the inmortal lyrics Nel blu, dipinto di blu from Volare sung by Domenico Modugno (skip the ads). Dean Martin also sang it, but Dino’s version is a “tad slick”, according to one member of the team, though another claims that Domenico’s strange arm-lifting movement reminds him of a policeman stopping traffic. See what you think.

thelonious corner pot

Edmund de Waal‘s visit to the Ledbury Poetry Festival last year reminded us how pottery and poetry are only differentiated by the one “t”, and looking at the quality of the ceramics produced in the UK any objective observer would have to agree that the state of pottery creativity is at an all time high, possibly aided by the “Great Pottery Throw Down” on TV. The most astonishing shapes, textures, glazes and sizes can be seen in galleries and in excellent magazines such as Ceramic Review, and pieces can express a range of emotions, from the calm of a Japanese influenced pot to the freewheeling hurly burly of glaze upon glaze on a large abstract shape. Inevitable, belatrova looks to see where it fits in and we conclude that for the painterly abstract quality and the treatment of the ceramic surface as a canvas we belong to a very small group. Our customers are very discerning, and many seem to have a disposition for the visual arts; but however discriminating, sharp and perceptive they are (and, of course, they are), with Spring around the corner and the sap rising we know that a Spring Open Weekend is a much anticipated opportunity to make up minds and go for that particular piece that will enhance the dining room, or sitting room, or patio.

blue planters

“Sometimes the world is a valley of heartaches and tears
And in the hustle and bustle, no sunshine appears
But you and I have our love always there to remind us
There is a way we can leave all the shadows behind us…”

Yes, by paying us a visit!

So please pencil in the 22nd and 23rd of April (10 am – 5 pm), when we will be at Bankside Studios in Ledbury along with makers such as Fleen Doran and Wendy Houghton, and others. Otherwise you can always visit the website.

splash pot waiting to meet you

“Slack ma girdle, Foxwhelp.”

October 18th, 2016/in Blog /by Peter Arscott

“Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run...” (John Keats)

belatrova bunch

At belatrova we started turning our thoughts to Autumn, what with the leaves beginning to turn and that scent of damp and smoke that permeates the countryside near the workshop. We also discovered a taste for perry – surprising given that we seem (from the blog) to be serious cocktail sippers rather than quaffers of fermented fruit juices. We told you how to make the perfect Dry Martini some time ago. Perry is very much an Autumnal drink, and we visited a local small holding to see how it is made.

perry made from blakeney red

Has this anything to do with ceramics or table making? Probably not. The Blakeney Red is a greenish yellow perry pear with a red flush on the sunny side, an old favourite which was even considered a desert pear in the 1600s. which could also be stewed and used to dye soldiers’ khaki uniforms. This popular pear is renowned for perry making and is considered one of the best single perry varieties. The perry we tried was made from this pear.

How does this link in to ceramics, I hear you ask? Well, perry pears had their heyday in the late 17th and early 18th centuries and it is thought that there are at least 120 Perry pear varieties, many so local that they were only ever propagated on 1 or 2 adjacent farms. The heritage of these pears leaves us with some fantastic variety names, including Dead Boy, Mumblehead and Merrylegs. Some cider apple names? Brown Snout, Foxwhelp, Tremlett, Slack-ma-Girdle.

worcester apples

So far we have found no obvious links to ceramics and pottery, however, Stinking Bishop perry pear is local and used by Charles Martel, cheese maker supreme and reviver of Single Gloucester, whose washed-rind cheeses are immersed in the perry for 4 weeks while it matures. It is made from milk of Gloucester cattle, and became famous when it starred in “Wallace & Gromit: the Curse of the Were-Rabbit“. Here is a picture of late Autumn lillies to wave away the scent of cheese:

some kind of lilly

Throughout Herefordshire there is a strong tradition of farm cider-making. Farmers produced cider to be drunk by the farm labour force during the following year, especially the busy times of hay-making and harvest. Farmers used to sell cider to local pubs and cider merchants for re-sale in towns. By the way, perry pear trees take much longer to mature than cider apple trees, thus:

“Who sets an apple tree may live to see it end,
Who sets a pear tree may set it for a friend.”

fruit bowl

Like the pear tree, belatrova has also paced its maturity to get to the stage we are now at. So if there is a seasonal change in the air, belatrova too reflects this. We have added two new categories to our website which we would love you to visit – just click on either: Fruit bowls and serving dishes and Ceramic art. Enjoy the visual sipping, get merry on home decor ideas, refresh your taste buds.

ceramic art? More Fresian than Hereford

an old stinker

belatrova – Open Studio Art Week 10 – 18 September

September 8th, 2016/in Blog, Latest News /by Peter Arscott

“The purest treasure mortal times afford, is spotless reputation; that away, men are but gilded loam or painted clay.” William Shakespeare

temptation

belatrova’s reputation may well be gleaming, but we would like you to see it up close and give it a good poke. We are happy for you to pick up any of our bowls and test its weight, or sniff it, or hold its cool surface against your cheek, even lick it. Pottery does this to people.

Clay engages the five senses.

listen

Put a porcelain pot to your ear and flick its surface with your middle finger; what a satisfying “ping” sound comes from it, clear and perfect and proving there are no cracks in it. How horrible it is when we take a piece out of the kiln and the ping is more a “plock” sound – disappointment soon follows as a hairline fracture shows up.

look

Touching pots is part of the experience, both when you are making them and when you are choosing one to buy. Do your fingers yearn to feel the rough textured surface of an unglazed vase or do they prefer the smooth milky whiteness of glazed porcelain? And what about plunging them in wet clay and making shapes?

Your eyes can be drawn to certain pots for all sorts of different reasons: colour, glaze, shape. Try holding up a piece of fine porcelain up to the light and wonder at its translucence.

lick

And eating clay? Well, it is an acquired taste, but some people swear by it. It helps keep toxins from being absorbed into the body, the minerals that make up Bentonite clay work together to absorb heavy metals and other toxins in the gut. And kids seem to love it. “I am so happy that there are other people who love eating clay. I’ve been eating it since my pregnancy 20 years ago. I love the smell of wet earth in my mouth. Yum, yum” Mrs Elvira Fingerhut of Neasden, London, UK.

sniff

Finally, smell….mmmm, a bit of a challenge, this one. Sometimes it can smell of rotten eggs. But sometimes it is just damp and musty, like Autumn approaching with all its mellow fruitfulness.

Yes, Herefordshire Art Week is with us from 10 – 18 September, which means that we are one of over 150 makers and artists in Herefordshire who will be open to visitors throughout the nine days.

And for a limited period only we have knocked 10% off the price of everything in stock! Would you like to know how to get your discount? Just click here.

One of the advantages in coming to our venue is that you get to see the work of three other ceramicists who form the Bankside Studios cluster: Fleen Doran, Stuart Houghton and Wendy Houghton.

This annual event draws many people to our workshop, and many are dropping in not just for the excellent cake and tea they are offered; you get to experience an exhibition of contrast and style, with informal demonstrations and the chance to talk to the artists.

Furthermore, there is an irresistible sale of belatrova pieces in one section of the workshop, and wonderful bargains to be found. Do come along, say “hello”, and handle, stroke and pat our pottery.

thelonius splash pot

Directions: in Ledbury follow the red h.Art signs from Lower Rd or New St into Little Marcle Rd. Follow signs to studios behind Alfa-Tech Garage. Parking is available. We are open 10 – 5.30 pm.

big blue

The Bankside bestiary

July 30th, 2016/in Blog, ceramic art, Latest News /by Peter Arscott

It has been busy at the studio this summer, so it was not until recently that we started to take in the seasonal activity outdoors; the (slightly) warmer weather, the greenery, the butterflies, the bees, the birds. The various creatures reminded us that most animals that feature in belatrova have been portrayed or referred to in our blogs, not in “real life”. Should we have a pet at the workshop? We at belatrova do not have an official pet, as such, though we have had many animals on our blogs since 2013, and, just to remind you, we are scattering images of them throughout this blog.

Ed Millipede

Many claim that pets have a calming effect on our bodies and minds, that they reduce blood pressure and lower stress, that pets at the workplace make employees more creative, productive, and cordial with each other. This would be a good thing.

Jim

A digital online marketing agency conducted a survey of three thousand office workers, and 16% had an office pet, the top ten pets being fish, dogs, cats, tortoises, birds, rabbits, guinea pigs, geckos, snakes and tarantulas. As many as 55% of those canvassed admitted they would feel more motivated if they did have a pet in the office, though in our case, since one of us is a serious arachnophobe, tarantulas would be at the bottom of the list. This is despite Ziggy the house spider being a past visitor (see Oct blog 2014).

Ziggy

Indeed, a research undertaken on domestic dogs and human health (published in 2007 in the British Journal of Health Psychology) suggested that pet owners tend to be healthier – dog owners have lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol and are less likely to have minor and serious health problems. We wonder if this also applies to cockerel owners?

giant alarm clock

So what is it about dogs? A carnivorous mammal that typically has a long snout, an acute sense of smell, non-retractile claws, and barking, howling, or whining voice, the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris) is a domesticated animal selectively bred for various behaviours, sensory capabilities, and physical attributes.

Rowan

Their long association with people has allowed dogs to be uniquely attuned to human behaviour. We very occasionally get a visit from one of these fearsome creatures, but only with her (so-called) master. Rowan has been selectively bred to sniff out and hunt badgers, but she kindly agreed to having her Brockian search interrupted and posed for us in a belatrova birdbath with great dignity.

workshop area favoured by dogs

And just in case we have digressed a long way from our intended theme, let us show you a few of our ceramic pieces. All totally unrelated to beasties, but it is what we do best:

juggler serving dish

large Valencia serving dish

square platter

parahelion – coffee table

wave bowl with hidden Ziggy

And so it’s goodbye from him…

elephant on the keyboard

June 2nd, 2016/in art, art ceramics, Blog, ceramic art, Latest News, pots /by Peter Arscott

With an Open Summer Weekend (Sat 2nd and Sun 3rd July) just around the corner, something happened at the Bankside Studio recently. The ghost of Thelonius Monk made itself known and whispered strange and wonderful things into the ears of belatrova as we were making a batch of three legged bowls. Perhaps “Ruby my Dear” was playing on the cd player, whatever it was it made our hands dance and the unintended clay shapes seemed to be spot on. “What about the three legged bowls?” we hear concerned belatrovians ask. Well, we did make them, though a few days later, after we had returned from Monkland.

Thelonius Pugmill and two friends

Taking a brief trip to Monkland is highly recommended: you will come back refreshed and brimming with more ideas than usual. It is liberating to make pieces without worrying about the end result, and if one piece turns out to be a failure then the next one will be stronger for it. In this we were aided and abetted by our hard working pug mill who, as some of you may remember, is called “Thelonius” and who is by far the hardest working member of the team.

For a ceramicist, going to Monkland means that you accept one condition only – that there is no wrong way to make ceramics. This is how you have to approach the lump of clay, just as Thelonius Monk approached his piano. As he saw it, “The piano ain’t got no wrong notes!” and this explains his unique jazz style, which includes percussive playing, unusual repetitions and dissonant sounds, and a surprising use of silences and hesitations. Click here to listen to “Don’t blame me” where there is a fine example of his style.

He also had the habit during performances that while the other musicians in the band continued playing he would stop, stand up from the keyboard, and dance for a few moments before returning to the piano. It was in this spirit that one of our team tried to show his fellow potters how to dance a jig while violently flattening clay with a rolling pin and, at the same time, sipping tea from a mug.

A debate followed as to whether this performance was a fine example of syncopation made flesh, since in music, syncopation involves a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected, thus making a tune or piece of music off-beat – “a disturbance or interruption of the regular flow of rhythm”. We agreed this was the case, and that it would be incorporated into a piece, which in turn would be entitled: “Thelonius made me do it“, subsequently the title for the whole series.

Many of you will want to see this growing collection of freewheeling pottery, and we would like to show it to you, so make an entry in your diaries for Saturday 2nd and Sunday 3rd of July (10 – 5pm) when we will be opening the workshop for our Summer Weekend.

Philip

Nellie

And we will also be showing our bowls, lamps, tables and birdbaths, as well as our new range of wave bowls and scoop bowls, because not everybody loves Thelonius as much as we do. Philip Larkin, a much better poet than jazz critic, considered Thelonius Monk nothing more than “the elephant on the keyboard”, but Monk is the second most recorded Jazz composer of all time, right after Duke Ellington. So put that in your pipe and smoke it, Philip – and just to rub it in, here is a link to a short video of the Thelonius pots spinning to “‘Round Midnight” arranged for saxophone quartet by Quartetto di Sassofoni Accademia, with no piano or elephant.

PS belatrova will be under the Ledbury Market House this Saturday and every Saturday in June – if you are in the area drop by and say hello.

PPS. We would like to thank “Botloes” for giving us such a great review on Houzz – we wonder if this mystery personality might reveal herself or himself?

Hasta luego.

Slabby McSlabface

May 10th, 2016/in art ceramics, Blog, ceramic art, Latest News /by Peter Arscott

Spring ceramic

At belatrova we make things because we like them, and think that you might too. We even make things before we know exactly what to call them. We have been slab rolling and glazing pieces for the outdoors and indoors, and though, strictly speaking, they are “slab pots” we think there is a better name for these ceramic containers, or planters, or plant pot holders, or umbrella stands, or whatever.

They are so flexible, you see, that they can be used in many ways.

Manhattan stands alone

However, belatrova will not fall into the mistake made by the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council who asked people on the internet to name its newest research ship. The internet returned with the magnificent, if inappropriate, RRS Boaty McBoatface. So we are not guaranteeing that we will adopt any name suggested by majority response.

triumvirate

It is May, and many will be turning their thoughts to the garden. If you are dreaming of salvia, foxgloves, Sweet William, wallflowers, poppies, nasturtium and scabious, now is the time to sow. You can grow your favourite flowers and vegetables anywhere by planting them in beautiful containers that enhance the setting. “Container gardening” in planters or plant pot-holders allows your imagination to wander all over your garden.

planter

Unlike many planters and holders belatrova’s are colourful and bold, and when placed strategically in the garden or patio, they can brighten the space around them as well as complement the plants inside. They work well in small to medium spaces, or in clusters and groups.

a bonboniere, but you can call it “Fred”

On the other hand, you can use them in entirely different ways indoors – as slab pots, ceramic umbrella stands, bonbonieres (great word) or just plant holders. With indoors in mind, these do not drain because they have no holes at the base, but we can easily make them with drainage holes if commissioned to do so. If you are looking for a bold statement then imagine it as a centrepiece of a side table or counter, or on the floor next to the fireplace, filled with dried sunflowers. The colours really stand out and brighten any space.

so practical

We are very aware that most of you do not live in stately homes or manor houses, but just in case one or two of you do, a fine umbrella, whip, or walking stick stand for any hallway or lobby is surely a “must”.

brushstroke blues for buddha

Try serving a punch or mulled wine out of one. We have previously given you the recipe for deliciously dark and cool Black Velvet (November 2014 blog) – imagine serving that out to your guests with a ladle from this unique tureen (do you see our problem? What can we call this adaptable ceramic?).

perfect for that awkward corner

We hand make our planters out of four large, rolled ‘slabs’ of clay and it takes two of us to put the larger pieces together. They are glaze fired at 1275 degrees – this is when vitrification takes place, making the ceramic tough and resistant to weather extremes of heat and cold. They will not crack in a frost.

looks good in or out

On occasions at the workshop we are overcome by the strange combined influence of our pugmill, Thelonius, and of our favourite jazz pianist, Thelonius Monk. This often happens on a Friday afternoon. We are slowly building a small collection of these inexplicable Thelopots, and we thought you would like a glimpse of one.

“Thelonius made me do it” series

We are opening our workshop to the public for a Summer Weekend on Saturday 2nd and Sunday 3rd July – please drop in, but if you’d like to come at any other time, just give us a ring – all details on our website: www.peterarscott.co.uk/dev

You can also visit us on Home of Artisans

banana

February 25th, 2016/in art ceramics, Blog, bowl, ceramic art /by Peter Arscott

banana blue

You will not be surprised to know that we take our research very seriously at belatrova, so that when we talked about a name for a new range of bowls and decided it was to be “banana bowl“, we discovered the revealing fact that the inside of a banana skin can be used to polish shoes.

banana rub

What else? Well, it can also be used to calm an itchy mosquito bite, and did you know that on average each person in the UK eats about 100 bananas a year?

banana scratch

We could go on. And we will.

Bananas are the most popular fruit in the world, and the banana is, in fact, not a tree but a high herb that grows up to 15 metres. It is believed that there are almost 1000 varieties of bananas, the most commonly known banana being the Cavendish variety, which is the one produced for export markets.

froot scoop

Enough. The fact is that our bowls are banana shaped, and thus their name.

centrepiece

We really enjoyed making these bowls. The shape is a whimsical and it truly stands out in any setting, whether it has anything in it or nothing at all. It has enough personality to speak for itself: notice the herring bone motifs in some, all contained by the rich cobalt brush marks.

fruit bowl

A unique hand made bowl, unusual but really elegant, and ideal as a way to serve fruit, or snacks, though it really comes into its own when used simply as a table centrepiece. The three legs give it a steady balance and a charming retro look, say we.

banana bowl drying

Each piece takes days to make, from flattening the clay and passing it through the slab roller, shaping and cutting and letting it dry for over a week, then biscuit firing it to 1000 degrees. We shape them over a large round cement garden ornament, as you can see in the image above.

If you want to see more images of our banana bowls do visit a new online outlet that belatrova has teamed up with: Home of Artisans, where you will also see some more examples of our wave bowls, which we mentioned in our January blog.

And did you know that the derivation of the word banana is from the Arabic banan, which means finger?

ba

ban

banan

banana

all fingers and thumbs

December 19th, 2015/in art ceramics, belatrova, Blog, ceramics, Latest News, pottery /by Peter Arscott

Orange Blossom cheer

It was Sir Isaac Newton who stated that, in the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone convinced him of God’s existence. And belatrova, stoically recovering from an injured left thumb after an unfortunate encounter with a kiln door, could not help but think of the usefulness of those five appendages that grow out of each hand – our fingers, or, strictly, our digits, if we include the thumb.

It turns out that our fingertips possess a high concentration of receptors, which means that they are highly sensitive to moisture, pressure, texture and temperature. Fingers are capable of feeling the tiniest, almost invisible, wrinkles on what appears to be a smooth surface, an extraordinary level of sensitivity. Thus we use our fingers as sensory probes to find out about the objects we bump into or are puzzled by, and so they are prone to getting hurt – they get burnt, cut, scratched, squashed and scraped. In belatrova’s case it was an injury due not to sensory probing but to simply forgetting where his thumb was as the kiln lid was being closed.

When not getting them injured, we at belatrova tend to use our fingers to poke clay to see how moist it is, or to smooth down the surface of a bowl before biscuiting, or to trim and cut around a shape, or to test how hot a piece is in the kiln (even if the meter indicates 90 degrees), or to brush on an oxide colour or to sandpaper the oak plinth of a birdbath.

mandarins look better on ceramic

What would we do without our fingers. Think of all the finger gestures we rely on: thumbs up, the OK sign, the V for victory sign, the middle finger sign. And pointing is so useful, and counting, and playing the piano. What about the index to your mouth for “silence”, and snapping your fingers, or just picking your nose? The list is endless.

“…Even now that sweet memory lingers
I was playing my guitar
Lying underneath the stars
Just thanking the Lord
For my fingers
For my fingers” Paul Simon

And you need your fingers to make cocktails. As is customary at Christmas, we like to offer our supporters and friends a new cocktail that has been tried and tested on volunteers at the belatrova workshop. We have shown you how to make the perfect Dry Martini, and a delicious Black Velvet, now we would like you to try an Orange Blossom.

Use a large snifter or brandy glass, or balloon glass.

Fill it with ice – perhaps three generous cubes

shake two drops of Orange Bitters into it (this you can buy online or at some shops now). Do not allow more than two drops – these things really matter.

A small splash of Elderflower Cordial

Fill two thirds of the way up with cold Prosecco (it must be cold)

Curl a thin sliver of orange peel onto the rim

Stir

Drink

star coasters

We at belatrova wish you all the very best for 2016, and we hope you have a Happy Christmas. As some of you know, we are always in and out of our workshop at No 9, so if any of you want to pay us a visit it is a good idea to give us a call first on 01531 634082, otherwise you can always contact us via our website: www.peterarscott.co.uk/dev or you can have a look at our ETSY site, or even our Pinterest boards.

Cheers! Salut! Salud! Santé! Prost! Salute!

Thelonius says “Happy Christmas”

weekend openings, many visitors

December 8th, 2015/in art ceramics, Blog, ceramic art, Latest News, wall arrt /by Peter Arscott

A big thank you to all our visitors who dropped by these last two weekends – it is always good to see new faces as well as the regular ones. Many of you took part in our “mini mural” competition which used an assortment of glazed ceramic pieces to very individual effect. And do they say something about the individual, we wonder? And here are the best ones (as judged by Thelonius):

: Alicia

: Barton Y

: Dave P

: Fleen

: Gonzalo

: Jane

: Lily

: Lu

: Roger

: Roz

: Spen

: Stuarrt

: Tim

: Wendy

Hmmm. Very difficult to choose a winner. Turquoise (or anything with blues and greens) is a favourite of the judge’s (who is given to pondering about life), and he says it denotes an ability to create emotional balance in your life, to express your hopes and dreams no matter how idealistic they may be and to make your own way in the world under your own terms, so he is awarding a prize each to Alicia and to Lily.

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