Slow Living with Luxury Pottery

I often describe my work as “exquisitely designed pottery for moments of everyday luxury”. What does that mean to me?

It means that I create each piece with thoughtful designs, intended for you to appreciate as work of art but also a durable piece of pottery that can keep up with whatever your life throws at you. I envision my handmade pottery mugs as part of your morning coffee ritual - whether you’re chasing your dog outside, wrangling your kids for school, or indulging in quiet time alone before everyone gets up. Maybe one of my rustic white pottery vases sits on your table with flowers that looked great 3 days ago, but you forgot to refresh their water and now they are wilted. Or maybe a snake plant lives in a harvest gold plant pot to brighten up your work space and give your eyes an interesting resting place during your endless zoom meetings.

Slow Living encourages a more thoughtful approach to your life, emphasizing the enjoyment of everyday activities and consciously choosing to live according to your values. While actually living slowly can be quite difficult (and you can find some very dogmatic thoughts on the subject), I encourage an all-or-something approach: looking for small ways to find calm in your days and recognizing that busy doesn’t mean better. How does this tie in with handmade pottery? It also means making fewer, but higher-quality purchases. The price of my work reflects the time + skill needed for each piece, and it is an honour to me every time you make a thoughtful purchase of Studio Stiina henna-inspired pottery.

Woven into your rich + varied life are little things that bring you joy, and I like to think that catching a glimpse of the tiny variations in my glazes or absent-mindedly tracing the texture on your mandala mug is one of those moments of small pleasures.

Studio Stiina Mandala mug in Rustic Blue. Photo by Darcy Vasudev

The texture on all of my handmade pottery items is hand-drawn on each piece individually, using my skills as a professional henna artist to create an engaging design. The technique is called sliptrailing; using liquid clay to draw the design. I use a cellophane cone (like a mini pastry bag) which is the same tool that many henna artists use. I learned about this technique from my henna friend Heather at Zenith Clay.

The design is drawn on the pottery piece when it is still damp and “raw”, and it’s fired in the kiln to fuse it to the surface. I then coat the piece with glaze that I create myself, and fire it in my kiln again to get the shiny, glassy surface.

The resulting piece is now vitrified, which means it is non-porous, and is food safe. You can put all of my pottery in your dishwasher or oven, and also nuke your coffee in the microwave when you inevitably forget about it at 10am.

My pottery studio is a place of mostly-quiet solitude in a small bedroom in the basement of our home, looking out into the pine-tree-topped mountains near Princeton BC Canada. Each piece of handmade pottery is made from a slab of clay and is formed using only my hands and a rolling pin, sponge, and a wooden tool. Making handmade pottery is one of the ways I am seeking some of those slow living moments while I raise my family. My pottery ships worldwide and it makes my heart happy knowing that some of my art lives in every corner of the world. I love hearing the ways that my henna-inspired pottery helps you slow down, brings you moments of calm, or helps you decorate your home in ways that reflect your personality. I am honoured that you want my art in the sacred space of your home.

With love and pretty pots,
Justine/Stiina Lustig
Studio Stiina