Waking the Studio: Preparing for the Spring Collection

Hello again.

February is a strange, beautiful month here at Pottery & Pig. The kind of month that asks something of you.

Outside, the garden is still mostly asleep—just a few brave snowdrops nodding near the frost-edged windows, the barest hint of green where we know the daffodils are supposed to be. The mornings come slow and grey, and the light has that particular February quality: thin, patient, waiting.

The studio feels it too. These weeks between deep winter and the first real stirrings of spring are when we do our waking up.

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The Quiet Before the Making

You might imagine a pottery studio as a place of constant motion—wheels spinning, hands moving, clay flying. And yes, when we're in full flow, that's exactly what it is. But February is different.

February is preparation.

These days are slower on purpose. We sweep and organize and take stock of things. We check every shelf, every bag of clay, every bottle of glaze that survived the winter. We clean the kiln shelves and mix fresh batches of the glazes that ran low last year. We sharpen tools. We make lists—so many lists—of what we want to try, what we want to learn, what we want to say with our hands this season.

It doesn't look like much, maybe, to an outside eye. Just two people puttering around a cold studio, lost in small tasks. But this is the groundwork. This is where the spring collection begins.

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What's Coming

We've been dreaming about this one for months.

The spring collection is taking shape in our minds—pieces that want to capture that first real shift in the air, the moment when you step outside one morning and something feels different. Softer. Possible. The light lingers a little longer. The birds remember their songs. The ground begins to give under your feet.

We want the spring collection to feel like that. Not the full bloom of summer, but the tender, hopeful beginning of things. Buds on bare branches. The first green pushing through last year's leaves. Mornings that still have frost but hint at what's coming.

We're still in the experimenting phase—the part where we throw forms just to see what happens, mix test tiles of glazes that might fail entirely, let ourselves play without knowing what we're making yet. Some of these experiments will end up in the collection. Most won't. But all of them are necessary.

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The Pig Part

A pig doesn't rush spring. It roots around in the softening ground, sure, but it also knows when to wait, when to rest, when to simply be present in the half-waking world. That's where we are right now. Rooting gently. Feeling the ground change under our feet. Getting ready.

There's a kind of joy in this, too—the quiet, anticipatory kind. The joy of potential. Of clay waiting to be touched. Of glazes breathing in their buckets. Of a studio slowly coming back to life.

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When to Expect the Spring Collection

If all goes well—and if the kiln cooperates, which it sometimes doesn't—the spring collection will be ready in late March or early April. Just in time for that real shift in the air, when the world remembers how to be green again.

It will be small, as always. A handful of pieces that feel like this particular moment, this particular year, this particular studio waking up.

We'll let you know when they're ready.

For now, we'll be here in the quiet February light, getting everything ready. Sweeping and mixing and dreaming. Waking the studio up, one small task at a time.

Thank you for being patient with us. For understanding that some seasons are for making, and some are for preparing to make. For being part of this slow, muddy rhythm.

With gratitude,

Pottery & Pig

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P.S. The snowdrops are out by the studio door. They're always the first sign. We thought you'd want to know