Jennie Gilbert’s taste for great design makes for pottery that you really want to eat off. Fanny Charles talks to Chalke valley potter Jennie Gilbert
William Morris famously said: ‘Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.’
These words of the textile designer, poet, artist, writer and social activist have been an inspiration to generations of designers, makers, artists, writers and thinkers – the perfect definition of good design. One of this area’s leading makers is among those who instinctively draw on Morris’s legacy. The Wiltshire potter Jennie Gilbert, whose studio is in converted farm buildings at Manor Farm, Fifield Bavant, in the Chalke valley, says: ‘The driving force behind everything I do is food.
‘I ask myself, what do I need at home? What would make life easier? I want things that food looks good on.’ And she wants people to share her passion: ‘I love the fact that you hold the bowl with your food. I love things that work and feel good in your hands,’ she says.
Her products include pasta bowls, platters and plates of various sizes, mugs, jugs, cups and covered jars – all of them demanding to be used and enjoyed. Ask anyone who has a Jennie Gilbert dinner plate or pasta bowl, whether in the lovely blue chequerboard pattern or the striking tweed design. Food served on this pottery just looks inviting and delicious. The chequerboard pattern resonates with the familiar chequered stone and flint construction of many old south Wiltshire buildings, although it is Jennie’s own design and not influenced by the local vernacular.
© Martin Phelps
The joy of making pots
Pottery is a very physical business – many potters have a strong physical presence, a dynamism and creative energy that is immediately appealing. Some potters even resemble their pots … or perhaps, their pots resemble them. The great John Leach was bearded and rather round, and his tactile, round and often brown pottery seemed an organic extension of him. Jennie Gilbert has a very physical energy: tall, rangy and frequently laughing, she makes pottery that makes you smile.
This year marks the tenth anniversary of her move to St Martin’s Workshops at Fifield Bavant, just a few yards from the tiny 13th century St Martin’s Church. In the light and airy pottery, Jennie makes her functional range and some decorative pieces.
She runs workshops and has occasional open weekends, but the pottery is not generally open to visitors. It doesn’t stop the opportunist caller – during the interview for this article two people arrived to ask if Jennie could mend a broken dinner plate. She explained, firmly but politely, that a potter can’t just stick somebody else’s plate or bowl back together – there would be different clays, different colours, different techniques (SuperGlue, or even a specialist china restorer, might be a better answer, she suggested).
© Martin Phelps
Finding Fifield
Jennie’s introduction to pottery was not planned. In the 1980s, she was studying for an International Baccalaureate at the Hammersmith West London College, where pottery was part of the curriculum. It immediately caught her interest: ‘I used to hang out in the pottery department – I loved it,’ she recalls. ‘I knew this is what I want to do!’
She went on to do a foundation art course at Swindon College and then took a studio pottery HND at Swansea. The main effect of this course, which emphasised industrial techniques, was perhaps not quite what was intended: ‘It taught me what I didn’t want to do,’ she says.
A short apprenticeship in the Loire region of France was more to her taste – she studied with English potter Christine Pedley in La Borne, known as ’the village of potters’ and home to the Centre for Contemporary Ceramics.
‘It is an amazing place,’ she says. ‘I learned a lot about pottery and about production and running a pottery.’ Back in England she worked with another potter for a few years and in 1993 she set up her first pottery at Pankhurst Farm, Chobham. She shared the workshop with a friend and joined the Surrey Guild of Craftsmen. ‘It was joyous, working for myself and doing shows.’
A few years later she moved to Project Workshops in old farm buildings at Quarley near Grateley (off the A303) where she ran her pottery for 13 years.
Then in 2014 she found the building at Fifield Bavant: ‘It was April Fool’s Day,’ she remembers – but this was a far from foolish move! She has space for all her materials and equipment, and shelves and cupboards to display the various ranges. Based in a peaceful valley with skylarks singing in the clear skies of the Cranborne Chase Natural Landscape (a noted dark skies area), the studio has beautiful light – and the off-the-beaten-track location means she can generally work in peace.
Shows and courses
Jennie likes to sell direct to customers, so you won’t find her work in craft galleries or gift shops. ‘I don’t have an online shop – my work varies and pieces within the same range can be slightly different,’ she says. ‘I take my work around the country so that people can choose the piece they want.’
During the summer she has a stand at several Potfest shows, as far afield as Scone Palace in Perthshire, Scotland, and including the first Potfest in North Dorset – held recently at Turnpike Showground, home of the Gillingham & Shaftesbury Show. The event, Potfest South West, is part of a nationwide calendar of weekend shows aimed at ceramic enthusiasts, collectors and anyone interested in pottery and ceramics. The new Shaftesbury event attracted a lot of visitors and will hopefully be repeated next year.
Local fans can meet Jennie and see and buy her pottery at her open weekend in December (visit her website for the dates).
But how about trying your hand at pottery with a skilled maker? Jennie holds two-day courses at St Martin’s Workshops and also runs courses at her sister’s property in south west France. She runs the Fifield Bavant classes with her friend, potter Emily Myers, and they cover the basics of throwing, pinch pots, coiling and slabbing. The two tutors take a maximum of six students, tailoring the lessons to beginners, improvers or students who need more focused attention.
The French courses are held at Le Mas Sarat in the Lot region, with two tutors, three wheels and up to six students – two-day beginners’ classes and four-day programmes for improvers. Jennie’s sister provides the accommodation … and the food.
Food is fundamental to her pottery. As Jennie says: ‘It’s all about food – preparing, serving and the rituals of eating.’
