This last firing of the gas kiln I used draw rings to get a better idea of when certain glazes matured. I’ve known this for a while, but was struck again at how colorless and boring the colors of the glaze and clay were when yanked and doused in a bucket of water. So colorless, in fact, that two different glazes appeared to be virtually identical when crash cooled. The sandstone body, also, is an uninteresting greyish white.

Here are those same glazes after firing for 16 hours and cooling slowly in the kiln for 36 hours. (first two pics are same glaze and body as the ring on the left, above. Second two pics same as the ring on the right.)

Notice a difference? Not only in the quality of the glaze surface, which is distinctly more blue with patches of sugary white, but also with the clay body color development?

The changes in this glaze are even more pronounced. No longer a colorless clear, but a soft creamy white translucent.

Last is a black glaze which was a featureless glossy black on the test ring, but which given time, developed into a rich black/brown with some crystal growth.

So, with that in mind, I wonder how nice these glazes and clay body would look after a 96 hour cooling period in the wood kiln?

On an aside, here is one of five toggle buttons I made and fired in a saggar with rice husks and cockle shells. Same body as the cups above 70/30 sandstone/Izumiyama porcelain. Approx. 6cm

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