The Andaman region
About our relationship to nature and how we minimize our impact
We are grateful to be living on a tropical island surrounded by the magnificent Andaman Sea. Nature in its all shapes and forms is a core element to us both, no matter where we go.
Our home studio is surrounded by a beautiful albeit a bit overgrown garden and due to its variety and natural state we have been lucky to have several birds nesting in some of the larger plants!
Long time ago, the fascinating Andaman region brought us together, and nowadays it’s such a meaningful part of our daily lives, and an endless source of inspiration to our work with clay.
And there it was rolling tirelessly in towards them, glittering and gleaming like soft blue silk, the same old sea that they had always loved!
Tove Jansson, from her book Comet in Moominland
Looking at our backgrounds, the nature we have experienced in our childhoods couldn’t differ much more from one another. Bee was born on an even smaller and more remote island in the Andaman Sea, and Salla is from the Arctic, born and raised in the Finnish Lapland.
In our daily, non-pottery related life we have our own filtering system converting tap water into drinking water, use reusable bottles, straws, takeaway-cups and containers, and overall refuse plastic where we can. We compost and recycle as much as it is possible in Thailand, and collect trash from the beach during our picnics, leaving shells and other marine life to where they belong.
Read more about our efforts in lessening our environmental impact within our ceramics process below.
The fragile aquatic ecosystems
We know the thrill of finding a treasure on the beach and having the urge to possess it, to safe keep it and take it home as a souvenir. It’s totally normal and perhaps an inherited part of human nature.
However, as we’ve witnessed the increasing amounts of trash in the sea and our beaches, and learned more about the importance of the organic matter, such as shells and dead corals on the beach, we have realized it’s best left there to play its role in the highly fragile ecosystem.
Clay is an amazing medium in bringing to life the unique shapes, ridges and textures of a seashell, while leaving the real shells on the beach. From the moment we started working with clay, we have been making our own plaster or bisque ware molds.
This process doesn’t harm the shells and once properly cleaned, they can be returned back to where they came from. While we do have a small “permanent” collection of less than ten of our favorite shells for our ceramic projects, we make sure not to accumulate more.
Turning harmful beach glass into functional art
We are really excited about the many possibilities of sea glass in ceramics! We have been experimenting a lot and each time are amazed by the unique results with the colors and the crackle underneath.
Beach glass in ceramics
- We collect broken glass from the beaches here at the shores of the Andaman Sea
- Depending on the desired size, the pieces can be broken into smaller ones and placed on a ceramic piece that has been bisque fired
- Glaze fire to 1220 C with 10min hold
Recycling clay
We ceramicists constantly make decisions in our work on whether something is worth completing or not. Glazing and firing a piece into stoneware in 1200+ Celsius means that it’s pretty much staying on this planet forever.
Luckily, as long as no firings have taken place yet, clay can be endlessly recycled. We are careful to recycle the scraps of all four types of clay we typically work with. We store the dry clay trimmings and discarded pieces until there is enough to fill the large glass jar pictured.
Our process starts with smashing the bone dry chunks into tiny pieces and covering them with water. After a day or two the wet slip will be blended well and spread on a board for the excess water to evaporate. Once it has reached a good level of moisture and after proper wedging it’s good to go again!