Ellinor's studio sits behind a greenhouse in the Cape winelands, in a converted stable that still smells faintly of hay under the clay dust. She's been throwing pots for eleven years, the last four of them full-time, and the stoneware breakfast bowls we carry come out of the same kiln, on the same afternoon, in a batch of eleven.
Every bowl is thrown on the wheel, trimmed by hand the next morning while the clay is still leather-hard, and glazed in a single oatmeal tone she mixes herself from feldspar, kaolin, and a small amount of iron oxide. No two come out quite the same. That's not a flaw she's trying to fix — it's the part she likes most about the process.
"A well-made object shouldn't demand attention, it should just quietly make the day slightly better."
We asked her why bowls, specifically, out of everything she could throw. Her answer was simple: a bowl gets used every single day, usually more than once, usually without anyone thinking about it. If something is going to sit in a cupboard and get picked up morning after morning for years, it's worth getting right.
The batch we carry takes about three weeks start to finish — a week of throwing, a week of trimming and bisque firing, and a final week for glazing and the second firing. She fires eleven at a time because that's what fits the kiln. When they sell out, we wait for the next batch rather than switching studios.
