Glazing, Experimentation & Paying Attention

I recently started my third session of the ceramics certificate program at Oklahoma Contemporary, and this week I think I finally learned one of the biggest lessons glazing has been trying to teach me.

Glazing has probably been my least favorite part of ceramics. It always felt so final and SO out of my control . I would spend hours making something only to hand it over to chance at the very end, eEeek! Sometimes pieces came out great, sometimes muddy, and sometimes completely something I coudln’t pick my work out of a line up.

For a while, I thought glazing was my mortal enemy.

Turns out, it just asks for more intention, experimentation, and… better notes.

This session, I tried something different… I started taking notes (what a concept). Actual notes. Glaze combinations, layering patterns, application methodology - all of it. But it wasn’t until I picked my work up from the studio that it instantly stopped feeling random, and started feeling like intentional experimentation.

One glaze combination I loved ran too much during firing, but now I know I need to stop the application higher and give it room to move without overwhelming the piece. Another time I layered two colors that were too similar, so the effect completely disappeared. But because I documented everything, I can now recreate those same ideas with more intention instead of starting over from scratch every time.

That realization honestly felt bigger than ceramics.

Part of the reason I started this journey was to relearn how to experiment and play - to stop worrying so much about outcomes and instead stay curious about what’s possible. Ceramics keeps teaching me that experimentation isn’t about a perfect end result. It requires attention, observation, and a willingness to keep refining - and if you do that it rewards you with discovery.

There’s something really satisfying about realizing that growth doesn’t always come from getting it “right” the first time. Sometimes it comes from paying closer attention and trying again.

And apparently, taking notes.