Category Archive

Responsive Clay

BY MICHELE QUAN Michele Quan’s ceramic objects Clay is a tactile and very responsive material, it lures you in, yet can be fickle and impossible to rush with potholes at each of its states, from wet to dry, dry to bisque…

Handmade for Japan

BY REBECA SCHILLER Top artists donate work for Japan relief auction Peaceful, tranquil, and serene Japan was rocked by a deadly 9.0 earthquake on Friday, March 11th,  and 36 minutes later pounded by a deadly tsunami that killed more than 10,000…

The Regal Benarasi

text: Richa Prakash Designs on its Future It has been mentioned in the Rig Veda as Hiranya Vastra or the golden cloth; it was once woven exclusively with cotton yarn and real gold and silver threads and it is still one of the…

East Meets West

BY CATHERINE SALTE. A Cultural Exchange Knit Up A knitwear designer finds a common language through craft. Twelve years ago, I moved to my husband’s lovely Aegean town filled with Greco-Roman and Byzantine ruins, tourists, and 30,000 inhabitants. While there were…

Potters for Peace

BY ANN SCHUNIOR Fostering better pottery for environmental sustainability Pottery-making in rural, underdeveloped countries is always hard work. The clay must be dug and processed. Equipment and tools are minimal; potters wheels are scarce. Potters work in isolation from each other…

Handloom Heritage

text: Julie Hall The woven saris of Maheshwar are reborn via Rehwa Society’s “barefoot business” techniques Roshanara Bi was unlikely to become one of the top weavers of aheshwar. Born into a poor family from the Muslim area of town, at…

A Rainbow Palette

BY MARCELLA ECHAVARRIA Ecotintes’ Future of Color The range of shades, the shine and unique warmth of natural colors cannot be achieved with industrial colors. Beyond their esthetic qualities, natural colors respect nature and people. Ecotintes leads a natural color movement…

Fire and Smoke

BY REBECA SCHILLER Nell Devitt’s clay tiles Working with clay, according to ceramicist Nell Devitt, is an organic process, but also challenging and stimulating both on mental and physical levels. Coming from a functional potter tradition, Devitt started to experiment with…

Creative Women

BY ANNIE WATERMAN Social threads Creative Women is known for their quality designs, hand-woven textiles, and improving lives. In 2003, Ellen Dorsch founded Creative Women, a wholesale business that works with more than eight female-run enterprises primarily in Africa and now Afghanistan. This…