Half Crazy Jug
2025
The piece
A full view, and the story behind it
This jug took the best part of five weeks. I'd been listening to old music hall recordings while I worked through the winter, and the line from Daisy Bell kept coming back to me — half crazy all for the love of you. There's something honest in it. The whole jug carries that line as its centrepiece, framed in the cartouche on the front.
The shoulder is wrapped in poppies and daisies, drawn straight onto the slip with a fine pin tool. I leave a lot of the red clay showing through — more than I used to. The contrast is what gives sgraffito its bite, and there's no point being shy about it.
The crown of cane-loops at the neck was a late decision. I'd thrown the jug with a plain rim and it didn't sit right. So I cut it down and built the openwork by hand over two evenings.
Stage 01
Throwing
the form on the wheel
The piece begins on the kick wheel from a single ball of red earthenware. The body is closed at the shoulder and trimmed the next day once the clay is leather-hard, with the handle pulled separately and joined while both are at the same dryness.
Stage 02
Slipping
the white ground laid over the red body
Two or three thin coats of white slip are brushed over the leather-hard body. There is a window of about half a day in which the surface is firm enough to take a clean line but still soft enough to cut.
Stage 03
Scratching
drawing the figures through the slip
With a fine pin tool the foliage, flowers and figures are scratched back through the slip to expose the red clay beneath. This is the slow part — six to nine days at the bench for a piece of this size. Once a line is cut it stays cut.
Stage 04
Wording
the inscription, cut by hand
The lettering is drafted onto the slip in pencil and then cut out one letter at a time. The inscription on this piece reads — "I'm half crazy all for the love of you".
"I'm half crazy all for the love of you"
Stage 05
Glazing
two firings, and a thin clear inside
After a slow week under newspaper the piece is bisque-fired at around 1000°C. The outside is left unglazed — the contrast of red against white carries the work and a glaze tends to muddy it. A thin lead-free clear is brushed inside, and the second firing is at around 1100°C.
Stage 06
Final reveal
the finished piece
What comes out of the second firing is the piece as it will stay. Held in the hand for the first time, the slip has hardened into the body and the cut lines have darkened a shade. From clay to kiln, most pieces take between three and six weeks.
Stage 07
Specifications
the bare facts of the piece
- Materials
- Red earthenware, white slip
- Dimensions
- 42 × 28 cm
- Year
- 2025
- Status
- Available
- Inscribed
- I'm half crazy all for the love of you