burning terracotta

At college someone accidently put a terracotta pot into the porcelain firing... we expected disaster but got a beautifully toasted and very dark pot. Had been meaning to try this out myself and at last have started testing slip cast terracotta at high temps.

The clear glazed inside makes the pot almost black. Great texture on unglazed areas - a little bit of grit in the clay gives a good feel. I will experiment with a white glaze next time and see how that looks. The pots are amazingly strong and they did not seem to have the same warping/memory problems as porcelain. And I can do a mixed firing with porcelain which is important when trying to juggle space in a tiny kiln. Definitely worthy of more experiments and worth looking at combining porcelain and burnt terracotta items.