How do I get my pottery fired if I do not own a kiln?

Not owning a kiln is the normal condition for a potter. Kilns are expensive, heavy, need a dedicated electrical supply and ventilation, and firing one for a handful of pieces is uneconomic. The whole hobby is set up around shared firing, and the practical skill is knowing how to work with a firing service rather than around one.

Safety

Step by step

1. Find the service before you buy clay.Search for local pottery studios, community art centres, adult education colleges and makerspaces. Many have a public firing service, often unadvertised. Ask what clay they fire, at what temperature, and what they charge.
2. Buy the clay they will fire.This is the constraint people discover too late. A studio firing to a particular temperature cannot fire a clay rated for a different one, and mixing them damages other work. Buy the clay they recommend, ideally from them.
3. Understand the two firings.The first — bisque — turns dry clay into a hard, porous, permanent ceramic. The piece is then glazed. The second — glaze firing — melts the glaze into a glassy surface. Two firings means two fees and two waits, usually several weeks in total.
4. Make the piece an even thickness.Roughly a centimetre, consistent throughout. Thick and thin areas heat and expand at different rates, and the piece cracks. Thick lumps also hold moisture that turns to steam and blows the piece apart.
5. Leave no trapped air and no sealed void.Any sealed hollow — a solid-looking sculpture built round a ball of clay, a hollow shape with no opening — traps air that expands and bursts. Hollow forms need a small hole somewhere discreet.
6. Dry it completely, then dry it more.Bone dry means room temperature to the touch, uniform in colour, and no longer losing weight. Weeks rather than days for a thick piece. Firing damp clay is the most common cause of a piece exploding, and it takes other people's work with it.
7. Ask about glazing before you commit.Some studios glaze for you from their own range; some let you glaze and then fire; some do not glaze at all. Glazes have their own temperature ranges and food-safety ratings, and the studio decides what is available.
8. Take it in clean, labelled and packed.Unfired clay is fragile. Wrap each piece, and mark your name on the base with an underglaze pencil or a scratched initial — a shelf of unfired pots from a dozen people is otherwise unidentifiable.

Tips

• Joining a studio as a member or taking a short course is often cheaper than paying per firing, and it includes clay, tools, a wheel, glazes and someone to ask.
• Expect the piece to shrink. Clay loses a noticeable percentage of its size between wet and fired, which matters if the piece has to fit something. Ask the studio what their clay does.
• Small test tiles fired alongside your work tell you what a glaze actually does on that clay at that temperature, which is impossible to judge from the pot of glaze.

Common mistakes

• Making the work before finding the firing service — The clay may be wrong for their kiln, the size may not fit their shelves, and the form may be one they will not accept. Ten minutes of asking first saves the whole piece.
• Taking in work that is not bone dry — Residual water turns to steam and the piece bursts, which can damage every other piece on the shelf and the kiln elements. Studios inspect for this and will refuse work.
• Putting air-dry clay in with fired clay — Many air-dry clays contain fibres and binders that burn off badly or do not vitrify, and they can contaminate a kiln. Never do this without asking, and expect the answer to be no.
• Assuming a glaze is food safe — Food safety depends on the specific glaze, the clay and being fired to the correct temperature. Only the studio can tell you whether a given combination is rated for food, and it is worth asking explicitly.

If it doesn't work

Questions people ask