Teapot: Soda Mint Drop

One of the my favorite teapots I've made.  Gently altered with added mishima lines and finished with sprayed glazes and the perfect soda firing. Pours with nary a drip. 

Petite.  The body is just under 4" wide and 3.25" high. 7 tiny holes between the body and the spout to let the tea out and keep the leaves in.  Perfect for one.

The shino glaze on the inside got a hearty amount of carbon trapping resulting in a smoky look, which is common in soda firings.  The variation is half the fun. 

Each soda fired piece is one-of-a-kind as atmospheric firings are unpredictable and can yield stunning results.  Soda firing takes an enormous amount of time, energy, labor and resources and is usually a community effort.  In the soda firing process, soda ash (sodium carbonate) is added to the kiln at cone 9 (2300°) and the sodium vapor combines with silica in clay to form sodium-silicate glaze.  The soda also interacts with the slips and glazes to create swirling unpredictable colors that shift and change around the piece.  The marks on the bottom are from the wadding used to hold the piece up off the kiln shelf so that glaze drips won’t fuse it to the shelf.  They can leave lovely flame marks and are a telltale sign a piece is soda fired, though they don’t always happen, especially in low soda areas of the kiln.

Lid is slightly warped from the volatility of the firing but is still perfectly functional.

A delight, overall.