The red rich clay of the shores of the Irrawaddy river and Inle lake has for centuries provided Myanmar potters a good base to produce their wares.
Myanmar Clay Works (MCW) is a project that works with local potter families drawing on their skills and knowledge while creating additional product lines with a contemporary feel and purpose. They aim to transform traditional clay pots to multi-purpose items for home decoration and kitchen use by using food safe glazes. They are also exploring ways to create food safe glazes locally for sustainability with an overall aim to contribute to livelihood development.
We have been eagerly following and supporting the projects of MCW over the past few years. This year they have been spending a lot of time in Twante working with 6 different families and kiln owners with a focus on new designs, quality improvement, and applying food safe glaze to make it more functional, and safe.
Twante is a small village across the river from Yangon that is famous for its clay potters. During first phase of the project in Twante the team spent time visiting many different small businesses and finally decided to work with 6 different families with an initial focus on improving existing designs, techniques and quality of clay. Once the skills are improved new designs were introduced. Local potters were able to draw on the skills and knowledge of Dutch potter Ilona van deBraak and local masters from Twante while sharing their own secrets of the trade.
The project currently makes use of the existing wood kilns in Twante for biscuit firing - biscuit means any pottery after the first firing and before any glaze is applied. Currently the project relies on an electric kiln, based in Yangon, for the food safe glaze application – as it needs to be baked at a high and stable temperature, and the environment needs to be free of dust. The next phase of the project will focus on improving the facilities to apply food safe glaze on site.
Hla Day has received the first trial batch, and we LOVE what we see so far. There are lots of different sizes and bright colours to choose from. We invite all of our pottery loving customers to come into the shop and help us create the new collection by letting us know what you would like to see more of – and get in quick because we don’t expect these clay beauties to last too long on our shelves.
