Next start
August 25, 2026
Highgate
·
Available
A structured introduction to wheel throwing and hand-building. Eight sessions to develop real skills, with clay and glazes provided.
The trade-off with eight weeks is time per technique. Compared to a 12-week course, there's less room to repeat each skill, refine your pieces, or develop personal projects between sessions, but more than the 6-week introduction.
Each session is three hours with the same tutor each week, working through new techniques as a group and then practising at your own pace. By the end of the course you'll have made several pieces across both hand-building and the wheel, plus an introduction to glazing.
The course suits people who want a structured introduction with enough time to practise the basics properly, without committing to twelve weeks. No previous experience needed. Most students arrive having never worked with clay.
Tuition, clay, glazes, and use of studio equipment are included. Firing is the only thing charged separately, at £2.25 per 500ml, which works out at about £2.25 for a mug-sized piece.
Each session builds on the last. The course covers both hand-building and the wheel, with time to practise each step before moving on.
Week 1
+
Your first session is about getting comfortable with the studio, the clay, and the tools you'll use over the next eight weeks. You'll get an introduction to studio safety, learn how to prepare clay by wedging, and start your first hand-building project using pinching and coiling techniques.
Wedging · Studio safety & etiquette · Tools & materials · Pinching
Weeks 2–3
+
Building on the hand-building from week 1, these sessions cover the three core methods: pinching, coiling, and slab building. These techniques are the foundation of all ceramic work and give you a feel for clay as a material before moving onto the wheel.
Pinching · Coiling · Slab building · Joining & scoring
Weeks 4–5
+
This is where the wheel comes in. You'll learn to centre clay, pull up walls, and shape basic forms: cylinders, bowls, cups. You'll also learn to trim your thrown pieces to refine their shape. There's also time for further hand-building projects, for students with a strong affinity to those techniques.
Centring · Cylinders · Cups · Bowls · Trimming & turning · Hump moulds · Pulling handles
Week 6
+
The last making session before glazing. You'll apply decorative techniques to your pieces and finish any work in progress. Most students use this week to refine their favourite pieces.
Decorating with slips · Sgraffito
Weeks 7–8
+
The final two sessions focus on surface and finish. You'll learn to apply glazes, use wax resist for patterns, and prepare your work for the kiln.
Glaze application · Wax resist
Surface treatments
Decorative work done before glazing: slip, sgraffito, carving, stamping, or burnishing. These add texture, pattern, or contrast that the glaze then interacts with in the kiln.
Layering
Applying one glaze over another to create a surface different to either glaze alone. The result depends on the chemistry of both glazes and how thickly each is applied.
Advanced glaze application
Glazing methods that go beyond basic dipping. Brushing, pouring, layering, and combining glazes to control where and how the surface develops in the kiln.
Bisque preparation
Getting your pieces ready for their first firing. Final trimming, signing the base, and making sure each piece is bone-dry and crack-free before it goes in the kiln.
Foot rings
The raised ring on the base of a thrown piece. Trimmed from a thicker base once the clay is leather-hard, the foot ring lifts the piece off the surface and gives it a finished underside.
Final trimming
The last pass before bisque firing. Sharpening foot rings, checking wall thickness, and making any last adjustments to the form while the clay is still workable.
Advanced trimming
Trimming complex forms like bottles and vases, where the foot needs to balance a tall or curved body. Done at leather-hard, often with the piece held upside down on a chuck.
Wide-form centring
Centring a larger volume of clay across a wider base than you would for a cylinder or bowl. Harder to feel because the centre of mass sits further from the wheel head.
Throwing batts
Removable wooden or composite discs that fit onto the wheel head. Wide, flat, or fragile forms get thrown on a batt so they can be lifted off without distorting before they've stiffened.
Platters
Larger and lower than plates, with a flat or shallow centre and a defined rim. The wider footprint makes them harder to centre and harder still to lift off the wheel intact.
Plates
One of the hardest forms to throw well. The wider, flatter shape tests your centring and wall control in a different way to cylinders or bowls. Usually thrown on a batt so it can be lifted without warping.
Belly shapes
Forms that swell outward through the middle before tapering at the top. You control the clay's outward curve from the inside, a different challenge to collaring inward.
Bottle shapes
Thrown forms with a narrow neck and wider body. Building one needs control of collaring throughout the throw so the shoulder and neck come out in proportion.
Collaring
Narrowing the opening of a thrown form by squeezing inward as it spins. The technique works against the clay's tendency to widen and is the foundation of bottles, vases, and any enclosed shape.
Glaze introduction
An overview of the glazes we keep in the studio and how to choose ones that suit your work.
Cups
Cups build on the cylinder. Same throwing technique, with extra attention to wall thickness for comfortable handling and a clean rim for drinking.
Wax resist
Applying wax to areas you want to keep glaze-free, creating patterns and contrast between glazed and unglazed surfaces.
Glaze application
Dipping, brushing, and pouring. Each method produces different results. You’ll test on sample tiles before committing to your pieces.
Sgraffito
Scratching through a layer of slip to reveal the clay colour beneath. A simple technique that produces beautiful, graphic results.
Decorating with slips
Coloured liquid clay applied to the surface before firing. You can brush, pour, dip, or trail it for different effects.
Pulling handles
Pulling handles from a lump of clay and attaching them to mugs and jugs. A satisfying skill that takes your thrown work to the next level.
Hump moulds
Using plaster forms to shape consistent pieces. Useful for plates, shallow bowls, and repeatable shapes.
Trimming & turning
Once your thrown pieces have dried slightly, you’ll flip them over on the wheel to refine the shape, add foot rings, and clean up the base.
Bowls
Opening out from a centred lump into wider, shallower forms. Different hand positions and a different feel to cylinders.
Cylinders
The foundation form. Mugs, vases, and tumblers all start as cylinders. You’ll learn to pull walls up evenly and control thickness.
Centring
The essential first step. Getting a lump of clay perfectly steady on a spinning wheel. It takes practice, and your teacher will work with you until it clicks.
Joining & scoring
Scoring, slipping, and assembling separate pieces of clay. The fundamentals of making anything with more than one part.
Slab building
Rolling flat sheets of clay and assembling them into structure. Boxes, planters, angular forms that the wheel can’t produce.
Coiling
Building walls ring by ring for larger forms. You’ll learn to roll consistent coils and join them securely to create pots, vases, and sculptural pieces.
Pinching
The simplest and oldest forming method. You’ll make a small vessel entirely by pinching the clay walls thinner. It teaches you how clay responds to pressure.
Tools & materials
What each tool does and when to reach for it. Ribs, wire cutters, trimming tools, sponges, and more.
Studio safety & etiquette
Dust management, safe use of equipment, kiln protocols, and keeping your workspace clean. We take this seriously because ceramic dust is no joke.
Wedging
Learning to condition clay by hand, pushing, folding, and working it until it’s smooth and free of air bubbles. This is how every session starts.
Your fired pieces will be ready to collect from the studio two to three weeks after the course ends
Choose a time and location that works for you. Every 8-week course covers the same curriculum, taught by the same teaching team.
Available
Highgate
·
Upstairs Classroom
Taught by
James RobertsMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Woodside Works, Summersby Road, London N6 5UH
Highgate Tube (Northern line)
5 min
On the edge of Queen's and Highgate Woods. Membership and classes across two floors.
/highgate
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Turning Earth Highgate
UPSTAIRS CLASSROOM WITH ONLY STAIR ACCESS
Teacher: James Roberts
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Leyton
·
Classroom
Taught by
Naemi MiyazuMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Turning Earth Leyton, 11 Argall Avenue, London E10 7QE
Lea Bridge
3 min
Our largest studio, on the Argall Avenue industrial estate in Leyton.
/leyton
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Leyton
Teacher: Naemi Miyazu
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the schedule of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Highgate
·
Main Studio
Taught by
Ruby DelaneyMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Woodside Works, Summersby Road, London N6 5UH
Highgate Tube (Northern line)
5 min
On the edge of Queen's and Highgate Woods. Membership and classes across two floors.
/highgate
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##Learn to make ceramics using a pottery wheel##
Turning Earth Highgate
Teacher: <a href="https://www.instagram.com/rubybelizeart/"target="_blank">Ruby Delaney
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Highgate
·
Upstairs Classroom
Taught by
Linda BarckMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Woodside Works, Summersby Road, London N6 5UH
Highgate Tube (Northern line)
5 min
On the edge of Queen's and Highgate Woods. Membership and classes across two floors.
/highgate
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Highgate
UPSTAIRS CLASSROOM WITH ONLY STAIR ACCESS
Teacher: Linda Barck
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Leyton
·
Classroom
Taught by
Simona AngelettiMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Turning Earth Leyton, 11 Argall Avenue, London E10 7QE
Lea Bridge
3 min
Our largest studio, on the Argall Avenue industrial estate in Leyton.
/leyton
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##Learn to make ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Leyton
Teacher: Simona Angeletti
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Camden
·
Classroom
Taught by
Hanna SalomonssonMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Camden Art Centre, Arkwright Road, London NW3 6DG
Finchley Road & Frognal Overground
2 min
Classes hosted at Camden Art Centre, a contemporary art gallery in Hampstead.
/camden
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth at Camden Art Centre
Teacher: Hanna Salomonsson
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Leyton
·
Learning Hub
Taught by
Simona AngelettiMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Turning Earth Leyton, 11 Argall Avenue, London E10 7QE
Lea Bridge
3 min
Our largest studio, on the Argall Avenue industrial estate in Leyton.
/leyton
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Leyton
Teacher: Simona Angeletti
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Waiting list
Camden
·
Classroom
Taught by
Simona AngelettiMore info about the course
Before you start
Camden Art Centre, Arkwright Road, London NW3 6DG
Finchley Road & Frognal Overground
2 min
Classes hosted at Camden Art Centre, a contemporary art gallery in Hampstead.
/camden
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Turning Earth at Camden Art Centre
Teacher: Simona Angeletti
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Camden
·
Classroom
Taught by
Hanna SalomonssonMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Camden Art Centre, Arkwright Road, London NW3 6DG
Finchley Road & Frognal Overground
2 min
Classes hosted at Camden Art Centre, a contemporary art gallery in Hampstead.
/camden
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth at Camden Art Centre
Teacher: Hanna Salomonsson
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. The structure of this course will be similar to here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Highgate
·
Upstairs Classroom
Taught by
Raymond MandevilleMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Woodside Works, Summersby Road, London N6 5UH
Highgate Tube (Northern line)
5 min
On the edge of Queen's and Highgate Woods. Membership and classes across two floors.
/highgate
[{"url":"https://bookwhen.com/turningearthceramics/basket_items/apply?basket_item_ids%5Bti-erjt-ti990%5D=1","desc":"You will be given your own 8-piece starter toolkit (a wooden sculpting tool, a metal needle, a wire clay cutter, a small sponge, a loop tool, a wooden tool for shaping, a metal kidney, a ribbon cutter) on your first class.","price":345,"title":"Course with starter toolkit","available":true},{"url":"https://bookwhen.com/turningearthceramics/basket_items/apply?basket_item_ids%5Bti-erjt-trajf%5D=1","desc":"You will need to bring your own tools (a wooden sculpting tool, a metal needle, a wire clay cutter, a small sponge, a loop tool, a wooden tool for shaping, a metal kidney, a ribbon cutter) to your first class.","price":340,"title":"Course without starter toolkit","available":true}]
##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Highgate
UPSTAIRS CLASSROOM WITH ONLY STAIR ACCESS
Teacher: Raymond Mandeville
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started
Thank you, and happy potting!
Available
Hoxton
·
Learning Hub
Taught by
Ruby DelaneyMore info about the course
Before you start
From
Book now
Railway Arches 361-362, Whiston Road, London E2 8BW
Hoxton Overground
6 min
Our original studio, in two glass-fronted railway arches on the Kingsland Viaduct.
/hoxton
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##Introduction to making ceramics using a pottery wheel and hand-building techniques##
Turning Earth Learning Hub
Teacher: Ruby Delaney
This class covers both hand-building techniques and wheel throwing. Please read more about the structure of this course here.
Please ensure you are able to attend as many days of the scheduled course as possible before you sign up. It's particularly important that you attend the first two. The classes are usually full so we can't move people between them or add extra sessions or issue refunds once the course has started.
Thank you, and happy potting!
Arriving on time
Please arrive 10 minutes early.
Each session opens with foundational techniques that everything else builds on. It's hard to catch up if you've missed that groundwork, and disruptive to others once the class is underway.
1
What to bring
An apron, old shoes, pen & paper, a towel.
An apron (synthetic is better than cotton, as it traps less clay dust). Shoes you don't mind getting earthy. A pen and paper for notes, as there's a lot to absorb in the early weeks. A small towel for drying your hands between steps. Clay, glazes, and equipment are all provided. If you booked with the starter toolkit, your tools will be waiting for you. If not, you'll need to bring your own.
2
Clay dust and your health
A genuine concern, not studio fussiness.
Long-term exposure to clay dust can cause silicosis, a serious lung condition. We ask everyone to wipe their work area with a damp sponge throughout the session and mop the floor around their space at the end. Clearing up is part of the session, not an afterthought.
3
Attending your sessions
Get the dates in your calendar before you book.
Please carefully check all the class dates on the course to make sure that you are able to attend all your lessons. Unfortunately, it is not possible to reschedule any missed lessons or join lessons on another course. Our classes run at full capacity and on different lesson schedules.
4
Firing and collecting
Work must enter the queue 3 weeks before your final session.
We fire your pots as they're ready, but the process takes time. Pieces made after the 3-week cutoff can be taken home as bisque (structurally hardened but unglazed). There's a small charge per piece: £2.50 per 500g of unfired clay, paid by card. Finished pieces are available roughly 2 weeks after your final session. We hold student pots for 1 month after the final lesson. Please make sure you collect them before then.
5
If this is your first time
Most people are a little nervous. That's normal.
You won't be the only one. Our instructors are used to working with complete beginners, and there's no performance involved. Just clay, time, and a room full of people in the same position as you. Long hair needs tying back, and long nails will make wheel-throwing noticeably harder.
6
Two students on what their 8-week course was actually like.
“Amazing course. Fabulous teacher. Great atmosphere. I wish my pottery achievements had been a bit more sophisticated but talent isn’t everything and that’s what the next course is for! Wonderful teacher, great experience, amazing studio. Can’t wait to do a 12 week course in October with Jonathan in time for Christmas presents!”
Shauna, Leyton, 2026
“Fabulous learning experience and seeing stages of process so clearly explained. A warm enthusiasm offered by the tutor and a memorable experience learning and creating. Simona is very enthusiastic tutor and pays individual attention. I really felt more confident than ever handling and creating with clay. I am very pleased to have gained fresh new experience and ways to create ceramics.”
Ismail,Camden Art Centre, 2025
Makers who started here
Each of them signed up for a beginners course with no particular plan to take it any further than that.
Andrea Roman
AR Ceramics
Started on a 12-week course in 2015. Now sells tableware through independent stockists across London and online.
@ar_ceramicsSayaka Namba
Sayaka Ceramics
Joined as a complete beginner in 2014. Exhibited at the London Design Festival and now supplies restaurants and cafés.
@sayakaceramicsBen Sutton
Ben Sutton Ceramics
Took his first class in 2015, became a member, and now runs a ceramics practice from his own studio in East London.
@bensuttonceramicsKat Evans
Kat Evans Pottery
Went from an evening course to a work-exchange position to running her own line of hand-built vessels and planters.
@katevansceramicsJono Smart
Jono Smart
Began on a beginners course and developed a distinctive style of bold, graphic ceramics now stocked in galleries nationwide.
@jonosmart