Saggar barrel firing

On March 1st. 2009 Judith and Gary Marvin invited the Palouse Studio Potters Guild members to a saggar firing at their beautiful home and studio outside Southwick Idaho.
Judith has done many saggar firings and taken workshops in saggar firing, so she taught the rest of us who had not previously tried these interesting techniques.

Preparing the Pots: this vase by Jeanne Wood was painted with ferric chloride, a few horse hairs were laid on it and then some table salt was sprinkled over the mixture before it dried. The next step was to loosely wrap it in heavy aluminum foil.

Loading the Barrel: Here is the "High Tech Kiln" ;-) Paige Van Weis places dried banana peels around the pots. The blue substance is Miracle Gro.

Firing the saggar: After the barrel has been filled to the brim with pots, various chemicals and combustable materials it was lit and allowed to burn for several hours. We adjorned indoors for a fantastic potluck lunch.

Adding horsehair: However, like the proverbial Children at Christmas, we couldn't wait until it was cooled down to see what the results were. It was still hot as can be judged by the red coals. At this point we ignored the pouring rain, braved the heat from the coals, and leaned in close to lay horsehair on the hot pots. You can see some carbon squiggles from the horsehairs.

Unloading the saggar: Alas not all pots came out successfully as this amphora shows.

Some came out great, however. Check out the wonderful colors on Judith's vase.