I never really set out to be an artist.

​

I was born and raised in the Potteries (Stoke-on-Trent) with a family history of potters through the ages.

 

As a child, I always said that I was going to be a vet which is probably the dream of most kids but I ALWAYS loved art. Sister Sunday's with my sister, Jess, and drawing on the plane to Greece with my Grandpop are some of my earliest and fondest memories of being 'artistic'. But in the 90's, we were never told that you could do it as a profession or career.

​

I learned the basics from my friend and manager whilst working at the Burslem School of Art, tiles, scraffito, glazing, oxides, the differences between firings and clays and I'm grateful for every second of it. But it wasn't until I started to buy my own clay and create things at home that I truly started to understand what being a ceramicist was about. 

​

I'd make little things I'd been inspired by on the internet, things that friends and family asked me to make as gifts, things for my mum and my uncle for Birthday's and Christmas but my Gnomes were my passion. I knew I wanted to lean on folklore of the world in my work, but I wasn't sure how. But Gnomes just felt right. 

​

Fast forward some years of using a kiln from the 80's with holes in, babysitting it every hour on the hour for 20 hours a day until it had finished firing my precious sculptures, and here I am now. Being supported by my friends, family and my hype-man / sanity-checker, Richard.

​

Me, my 21st century kiln that doesn't shock me every time I adjust the temperature and my global yet still very small business specialising in dog sculptures. Teaching pottery classes across Staffordshire, Derbyshire and  Cheshire with a following of over 3000 incredible, loyal and weirdly wonderful customers from around the world.

​

I am a Potter...that can't throw a pot.

​

-Laura

​

​