When I started, I would critique my pieces and be very harsh on myself but my teacher always told me that it takes 80 pieces to make one perfect piece. I can safely say that I have made a lot of pieces but only a handful do I find have no flaws or love completely.
When I was at a workshop, I heard her talk about how she makes her workshopees do boot camp in which they throw 20 cylinders in an hour (5 mins a piece). I really wanted to do it and since I’m leaving for Seattle on Monday, I did this rather than start anything new. I can say this was a lot of fun and will definitely do this again. I gave myself 25 pieces of clay, a sponge, a metal rib and a wire.
I made 24 cylinders total and this is a great way to figure out how fast and how well I can throw cylinder. So this is a timeline to see when I hit my stride and fatigue over the course of an hour. Every one of these is roughly a pound of clay, although some are a little less and some are a little more.
My stride was 2 to around 8 or 9 but I started to fall off the boat at 9-10 but caught second wind at 13 to 16 and then hit my second fatigue. My only good piece after that was 23, and I totally blotched the last piece but I was trying to make the walls too thin. I faced a lot of common throwing difficulties and errors during this time because I was throwing for speed and just the very basic shape rather than something pristine that I would keep forever.
This is my best cylinder that I made during the hour. I spent about 90 seconds on every cup and in total i spend about 55 mins (I got up to bring another piece in). I was incredulous that I could make a cylinder in 5 minutes yet it took me way less time.
Ok, the basic cylinder is the lifeline of pottery. There is no other shape as crucial or as done more often than this cylinder. Everything is shaped from a cylinder or bent from a cylinder.This is my 3rd cylinder and it is a pretty good representation of a solid cylinder. the walls should be even all the way down and the bottom should be flat and compressed. the trim should have a bit of a thickness to it and that is to allow durability. The slight Thickness of the bottom helps the walls stay firm and tall. When doing taller pieces I always keep the bottom thick to allow for more stability. Mainly, next time I want to do this, I would love to have all mine look exactly like this.
This is my fifth cup that I threw and it shows a couple of throwing mistakes that I made. The most obvious mistake is the weird indent that was made into the wall. This is caused by a thin spot. When I was pulling I realised that the pressure on the bottom was too hard so I released the pressure causing an indent. Although this one was pretty minor and can be easily over looked, especially from the outside. However, since I only lingered there for a second so it wasn’t a big deal.
The second weirdness that happened was the uneven heights of the walls. The left wall is much taller than the right wall and that is caused by one of two things usually. The first one being that the clay wasn’t centered before it was opened or the second thing being that the clay was centered but when I opened I missed the center slightly. This is an easy fix, I would just needle tool the top part until the rim is even.
Thin spots are a bit of a harder fix, because thin spots have about a thousand different outcomes. The most common ones are the one above and this one. 
This is a torsion when the top of the cup weighs way more than the thin spot causing stress and a slight collapse (just like what high school does to me). The best thing to do in this situation is take a metal rib and run it along the sides until it kind of unfolds itself. A tall metal rib makes everything better because it strengthens the walls and pulls the moisture out of clay.
This multiple cylinder thing was very fun and I definitely do recommend people trying it. After I did get back from Seattle, I did film a short video of me throwing cups on repetition so enjoy 🙂
Much Love,
Leila
Leila's Ceramics 