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A Northridge Clay Workshop Let Beginners Try Three Ways to Build

CSUN graduate art students opened their gallery for a week of community workshops, ending with a clay session where participants explored pinch, coil, and slab building without being assigned one identical object. The format turned technique choice into the event’s main decision.

Tim Zhang
Sources:The Daily Sundial
Event file

What actually happened

Original event
CSUN graduate-student ceramics hand-building workshop
Date & time zone
January 2025 · exact workshop date not stated in the report · America/Los_Angeles
Place
CSUN Art Department gallery, Art & Design Center
18111 Nordhoff Street
By
CSUN Art Department graduate students
Format
Open-ended hand-building session using pinch, coil, and slab methods
Entry
Entry terms not publicly stated
The original workshop

What happened

In January 2025, graduate students in California State University, Northridge’s Art Department opened their gallery for a week of workshops. The Daily Sundial reported that the programme culminated in a ceramics hand-building class led by master’s student Jess Rock.

Participants learned pinch potting, coil building, and slab building, then used clay freely enough to produce bowls, trays, and small objects rather than one prescribed project. The report describes the class as a rare chance for students outside ceramics courses to use the department’s equipment.

The Sundial’s original on-site video shows an adult university group working around shared tables in the gallery while Rock explains the session. Neither the story nor the video description publishes the exact class date, entry terms, capacity, attendance, firing plan, or pickup result, so those details remain unstated here.

From the event

See the event in motion

The Sundial’s original on-site report shows the CSUN gallery workshop, its adult university participants, shared clay tables, open making, and the instructor who introduced pinch, coil, and slab building.Open on YouTube
Why people join

Why the method menu works

Choice arrives after contact with the material. A newcomer does not need to know whether pinch, coil, or slab building suits them before booking; the room gives them a brief encounter with each method and enough freedom to notice which motion feels promising.

Putting several techniques at one table also changes the conversation. Guests compare how walls, curves, joins, and edges emerge from different actions, while the varied bowls, trays, and trinkets keep the room visually connected without making everyone reproduce the same example.

Host notes

If you host something similar

Keep the open choice inside a narrow technical frame. A qualified ceramics teacher should select the clay, portions, sample actions, maximum dimensions, tools, cleanup method, drying plan, surface options, firing schedule, and safe room capacity. Publish whether the samples and final object are practice-only, air-dried, or kiln-fired, along with the collection date and storage deadline when work stays at the studio.

The source placed its workshop during a week intended to build community and offer respite amid ongoing Los Angeles fires. A new event does not need that setting or a wellness promise. When a difficult local event is relevant, describe the session as optional creative time, avoid therapeutic claims, keep personal disclosure voluntary, and point people toward appropriate support services instead of treating pottery as care.

Make it yours

The Clay Method Menu

Try three small hand-building moves, choose the one that feels right, and turn it into one palm-sized clay object.

Everyone tries the same three miniature hand-building tests, then self-selects one method and one small object; the closing table groups finished forms by method so differences become visible across the room.

Creation prompt

Host a 9–12 guest clay method menu workshop: a qualified ceramics teacher demonstrates pinch, coil, and slab building, each guest tests all three on small sample forms, then chooses one method to make a palm-sized object before the studio manages drying, firing, and pickup.

Best for
Community studios, campus galleries, and neighbourhood art spaces working with a qualified ceramics teacher and a functioning studio workflow
Size & time
9–12 guests · About 90 minutes in the studio, followed by studio-controlled drying and firing and a later pickup window
Suggested entry model
Paid participant place covering the guided sampler, clay, shared tools, studio handling, firing, and a stated pickup window

Host checklist

  • Partner with a qualified ceramics teacher and let the teacher set the clay body, test size, final dimensions, tools, ventilation, dust controls, cleanup, drying, surface options, kiln schedule, and capacity.
  • Decide whether all three tests will be kept, recycled while wet, or fired; state that choice before guests begin and keep reusable clay separate from contaminated scraps.
  • Publish the exact inclusions, accessibility details, photo policy, ordinary cracking or firing variation, expected pickup date, storage deadline, and plan for uncollected work.
  • Keep personal stories and difficult local context outside the required activity; offer a quiet work option and avoid claims that clay relieves stress, heals trauma, or replaces professional support.
  • Create original method cards, demonstrations, examples, event naming, and visual identity rather than copying CSUN’s programme, instruction, source wording, photographs, or footage.
Create this event

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Questions hosts ask

Does every guest need to make the same object?

No. The shared structure is the three method tests and a palm-sized limit. Guests may choose a bowl, tray, holder, or abstract form once the teacher confirms that the object fits the clay, time, drying, and firing plan.

Should complete beginners try all three methods?

Three tiny tests make comparison possible without asking for three finished pieces. The qualified teacher may simplify or omit a test when hand strength, mobility, time, or material behaviour calls for another route.

What happens to the sample pieces?

Choose one policy before the event: recycle clean wet samples, keep them as unfired practice pieces, or include them in the studio’s firing workflow. Tell guests which option applies, label any retained work, and publish the pickup and storage window.

What would you make from this?

Share a local twist, a different format, or a gathering this story set in motion.

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