By Kath Gannaway
AN exciting addition to ECOSS at Wesburn will provide a professional level community pottery studio.
A gift of equipment, including two kilns, several pottery wheels, tools and glazes last year fired up the imagination and the ECOSS community, including potters Lucy Pierce, Chelsea McNab and Melanie Daymond.
A grant from the Yarra Junction Opportunity Shop kick-started the funding needed to get work started and a crowd-funding site was set up with a goal of raising $7000 to complete the studio and get a program up and running.
Ms McNab said work on the studio was well underway thanks to volunteers who had transformed the shed and were now ready to rebuild the kilns.
She said once completed, the studio would operate on a two-tiered basis, with Ms Pierce facilitating throwing and sculpting classes.
“These classes will be offered at a reasonable rate and ongoing as a way for those new to pottery to develop skills and learn to create a finished product,” she said.
There will also be sessions of ‘open space’ for people already skilled in ceramics but who don’t have the space or equipment to work on their passion.
Teachers will be able to hire the space to run classes.
“The studio will also slot perfectly in alignment with ECOSS’s school program,” she said.
ECOSS will be running clay workshops at the Ecotopia Earth Festival on Sunday, 26 March at Yarra Junction, as an introduction to what the Pottery Studio will have to offer.
To donate to the crowd funding campaign, visit https://ozcrowd.com/campaign/3131, or visit www.ecoss.org.au.
