Dear Emerson Creek Pottery,
I have two questions after seeing a wonderful example of your pottery:

Thanks for your time in responding, as I was born and raised on the lower
peninsula of VA, near Hampton. ~Tyler

Thank you for your interest. This is a very nice example of the sponging that we did on rims and edges of some patterns for about 10 years. My guess is you’ll find a date on the bottom of the piece in the 1980’s.

You asked how we used to do this spatter effect? Just like they did 150 years ago, with a sponge. Dabbing carefully and rythmically, (easier to say than to do), gives just the right amount of color, evenly dispersed on the rim.

No, we do not do “antique reproductions”. All of our work is original designs. But our pottery decoration has always been “in the style of” early American Folk art, with a flavor of Japanese influence that might have been occurring when the clipper ships were bringing back goods from the Orient.

Thank you for your inquiry and enjoy your historic pottery dish from the Emerson Creek Collection. ~ Priscilla

Good Afternoon, Readers!

Today, a customer sent us the following questions and photos about a collectible line of our pottery from the 1980’s.

I hope that my questions can be answered regarding 2 pieces of pottery The first is a smaller vase with your stamp and what I read as the year ‘89. It is gray pottery with blue wisteria vines on the front. The second piece is a taller juice jug with blue falling irises. Same make and year. I am looking for the value of each and how collectible they are. – D. Peters

Wonderful! It is great to see these old friends again. Yes, your pottery is very collectible. These are handthrown pieces, probably thrown by Jeff Podyma, in stoneware clay and fired by gas. Probably some of the last pieces in this genre. The decoration is Cardew Blue, ( cobalt-manganese mix) that we used to decorate all our pottery with. The smaller vase with falling leaves was called “Willow” and was probably decorated by Michelle Scalera who was the first decorator that I trained in our unique style. The other vase was probably decorated by me, a pattern that was a limited edition.

You asked about the value? We sometimes sell our “museum” pieces in our little retail shop near the factory. I would price these pieces at $65 or so for the smaller and $80 for the larger. Much more than you probably paid for them ( or the person who gifted them to you) but they have appreciated in value because they are collector’s pieces and harder to find.
Thank you for asking.
Priscilla

Well its that time of year again. We’ve got new patterns and its time for a new catalog. We thought that we’d do something different this year. Instead of shooting in the studio we went to a beautiful kitchen and bath showroom in Lynchburg. Kitchen & Bath Ideas has a variety of different set ups to display their cabinets and counters. They have both kitchen and bathroom set ups in their showroom. We hauled the pottery and all of our photography gear up there, and over a period of seven full days we photographed each pattern in a real home like setting. It shows off the pottery beautifully.

Now we are working on the design and layout of the catalog to make it easy to read the photos and see the pottery in a realistic setting. After a lot of thought and work we are on the homestretch. Watch the site for photos from our catalog shoot as they are put up.