Woodfired
Photography: Lea Kaae
Photography: Lea Kaae
A day’s work involves splitting logs with an axe – shaft in hands and a muscled hew. Thwack! Chopped logs land on the ground.
It may seem a far cry from the delicate and refined operations by the pottery wheels inside the workshop, but this is just as much part of the process – the kiln is the igneous heart of the whole affair and it eats the logs right out of your hands.
As daylight wanes the opening in the kiln becomes visible as a glowing, crimson-
coloured eye watching into the night.
When it’s closed, you see the narrow gaps
between the bricks like fired adders wriggling in the corners of the kiln-mouth. Little
cracks of light escaping from the sweltering, golden-bellied smithy. And still you have
to wait.