What a Stretch! How to Use Sodium Silicate to Create Crackled Texture on Pottery Surfaces Stretching the Possibilities with Sodium Silicate Don Ellis and Rodney Brodnax

Today’s pottery video is kind of like a two-for-one deal (except, of course, you don’t have to pay for anything!) In this excerpt from the DVD Pottree: Wedge to Fire, potters Don Ellis and Randy Brodnax demonstrate a couple of variations on the same technique in tandem. The technique involves using sodium silicate and a heat gun to quickly harden the outside surface of a freshly thrown pot. Then the pot can be stretched from the inside, creating a lovely cracked texture on the surface.

The video is as entertaining as it is informative because Don and Randy are longtime pals who jokingly rib (not in the pottery sense of the word) each other as they work. Enjoy! – Jennifer Poellot Harnetty, editor