Julia’s ceramic studio lampshade
It was a real privilege to be asked to make two willow shades for this gorgeous pottery studio. I’ve always wanted to be able to weave elegant, neat lampshades with gorgeous coloured willow rods. Before I went to meet Julia in her utterly dreamy studio space, a renovated stone building on the shore, that was what I thought I would aim to create for her. But after spending time together in the space I wanted to create something that would complement the age of this beautifully renovated stone building - something more rugged and rustic.
Julia wanted a lot of space in the weaving to allow light in her studio space, and she showed me a basket she’d bought from a local basket maker that she was using as a lampshade in the window. It looked perfect there, and so I decided to use chunky willow rods for this project. I chose my croft grown Dicky Meadows, which is very vigorous. I also used a little bit of Brittany Green from Carol at Barfad for the weavers in the first lampshade.
When Julia asked for space in the shades, I initially thought about an Irish weave or even trying fitching, but I realised there was no need to overcomplicate this. The more I thought about it, I didn’t want complicated weaving patterns or colours or super neat trimming. I had a good flick through Joe Hogans ‘Basketmaking in Ireland’ book before I started weaving for inspiration, and a postcard I had popped in there fell out. I decided to try and roughly recreate the shape of the creel in the photograph to reflect the history of the area and the importance of willow and weaving to daily life.
With some coffee and the stove on, and the most gorgeous lab curled up happily snoozing, we chatted about our creative journeys, how we ended up on the west coast (both of us being from the east) and about how perfectionism can affect our creativity. I wanted to make these lampshades for her studio with the idea that what we make doesn’t need to be flawless. I sometimes want to see the struggle and the journey in hand-made things. Where the rods had been scarred by bramble thorns as they were growing, I kept them in, to tell the story of the willow growing here in this harsh environment, with its acidic soil and salt-laden winds.
Massive thank you to Julia for trusting me with this. I look forward to returning and maybe even having a go at creating something with clay one day.
