27th January 2012

CHARD: A celebration with family roots

FOR 20 years the Eeles Family Pottery has been exhibiting at Forde Abbey near Chard.

This year’s celebration exhibition of newly fired ceramics will be on display from March 1st until October 31st in the medieval undercroft and contains work from all four members of the same family of potters, who are based in Mosterton.

David Eeles has been making ceramics professionally for over 60 years, and he is joined in the family business by his wife Patricia, and sons Benjamin and Simon.

Their established reputation precede them and not only is the family celebrating their 20th year at Forde Abbey, but they have been at their premises in Mosterton for a staggering 50 years this year.

The family work as a team and make a very wide range of ceramics by hand. These are individually decorated with a variety of clay slips, colours and glazes that are devised with extensive testing and firing, to produce the stunning collection of textures and patterns that their work is renowned for.

The potters make stoneware, porcelain and raku using basic ingredients such as ball clay from near Poole in Dorset, china clay from South Devon, fine alluvial sand from West Dorset, basalt from Somerset and granite from Cornwall, making their pots true West Country creations.

Stoneware and porcelain are fired in a large wood fired kiln to a temperature of 128 degrees centigrade. The results are ceramics which will bring pleasure in their use in the kitchen and as decorative pieces.

PICTURE: 20 YEARS AT THE ABBEY - Potters Benjamin, Simon, Patricia and David Eeles at Forde Abbey

CHARD: A celebration with family roots

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