Galway Pottery Classes

You will not receive a text or an email to let you know when your pots are ready to collect. They will be ready to collect 6 weeks after your course finishes.

The pots that you make during your pottery course need to go through quite a process before they will be ready to collect. They will be dried out until they are bone dry before being bisque-fired in our kiln to almost 1000 degrees. They will then be coated, by us, in transparent glaze before going through a glaze firing which usually takes about two days. This whole process can take up to six weeks to complete.

This means that you will need to wait for six weeks after your course finishes before coming in to collect your work. We will then hold on to your pots for you for up to two months. After this time we will have to get rid of the pots, so please come and get them! Below you will find plenty of options for times to come and collect.

This system of a time limit is slowly being introduced, so if you have been in to a course with us before May 2023, your pots should still be there to collect. This is within reason, but even if it’s been a very long time, you’re welcome to come in and check.

So, when your course has ended, please wait for six weeks from the date of completion. You can then go to this page, find the next available date and time, and then call in and collect your pots. It’s a good idea to set a reminder in your phone for six weeks after the course finishes.

The above link will take you to the ‘practice sessions‘ page. You do not need to book one of these time slots and it does not matter if the date that you want to call to collect the pots is fully booked.

These practice sessions are a good time to come to collect because someone will be there to facilitate you in finding your pots.

You can also call in for your pots (after the six weeks has elapsed of course) for up to half an hour after a class finishes or at the end of the day of a weekend course. For example, if the class is on from 7 to 9pm: you can call in anytime between 9 and 9.30pm. Or if the time/date that suits you is after a weekend course, these finish at 5pm on Saturdays and 3pm on Sundays. So after finding a date when a weekend course is running, you can pop in between 5 and 5.30pm on that Saturday or between 3 and 3.30pm on the Sunday.
You can find course dates and times on the website or through the following link:  Courses

Click on one of the class times that might suit you to call in (it doesn’t matter if it’s sold out) and then find a date that suits you, or go to one of the weekend course pages and find a date there. You can then call in during the half hour after that class/course time.

The class tutor should be able to help you as the class will be over at that stage, but to find your pots yourself: inside the door there are shelves, there is a list of names on each shelf, find your name on a list and then you will find your pots on that shelf.

The reason that we try to avoid people calling in during class times is that it can be disruptive to the class and therefore unfair to the students.

Only pots that are fully finished will be fired and will go through this process, i.e. pots that have been turned, decorated, named and left out to dry. Everything that is made and finished will be fired and kept for collection. This means that not every pot that you made during the course will be glazed and fired and there for collection, just the ones that were finished by you on the course. Nothing is thrown out but if the pot does not have a clear, full name on it then you might have difficulty in finding it.

If the times do not suit you to collect, please send somebody else in your place to collect the pots.

There are no guarantees with firing pots. We do our best and take the upmost care throughout the drying, bisque-firing, glazing, glaze-firing etc. but sometimes pots do not make it due to a variety of factors throughout the process.