Remodeling our kitchen created the opportunity to take my clay-work in a new direction. Although the initial design came quickly, executing the idea required working out some new methods. To make the extruded arch pieces and the stepped shelf support extrusions I first made a larger clay extruder using 4" diameter PVC pipe (see my plans for the clay extruder) to accommodate the larger extrusion dies cut from Baltic birch plywood. A piece of sheet metal stiffened with aluminum U-channel made a nice cutting blade that I could use with a "Goodwill find" mitre box. This worked great for cutting the still damp extrusions that would become shelf brackets. Drying the large slab pieces so they remained flat was accomplished by sandwiching them between layers of sheetrock (reinforced with aluminum U-channel so I could use them as wareracks). Drying the half-round beads so they were flat and straight required a little more work. By clamping the extrusions between aluminum U-channels joined with bungee cords and then sandwiching them between sheetrock I was able to dry them true. Assembly took a few tries. I soon realized that it would be easier to fit completely dry parts together than to fit drying pieces that would continue to shrink in differing amounts depending on how dry they were. A Japanese, pull draw style saw with its thin blade and larger teeth cut the greenware cleanly.

The backsplash was created using grolleg porcelain. Once fitted and fully dried the parts were bisque fired, glazed and then fired again to cone 10, reduction. Of course with so many parts to break, crack, warp or just not turn out I couldn't make just one, I made three and fired two along with a few extra parts. After unloading the kiln, back in the studio, there was a little back and forth, parts exchanging done to get the best possible finished piece for the installation. Even still I was left with a full backsplash as a sample for future projects.