Hands-on pottery history in Stoke-on-Trent with kids

The clay spun around on the wheel, my daughter’s hands stretching and flattening it, before gently coaxing it into a pot shape – all closely overseen by someone far more expert.

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There’s something rather magical about taking a solid grey-brown lump and transforming it into the shape you want… although it’s also a lot harder than it looks, when you actually come to do it.

My own clay seemed determined to escape and I was speckled with splashes – I consoled myself that it was my first attempt. My daughter, on her second pot of our weekend exploring Stoke-on-Trent with kids, looked suitably smug as her extra experience paid off.

Having grown up in the area, minutes away from Wedgwood, generations of my own family worked in the pottery industry. Even my primary school trips were to pottery museums – 25 years on, I vividly remember a cauliflower teapot on display, even if I’d never tried my own hand at making one before.

But when I told people of our planned trip, I realised that most don’t know how much there is to discover in Stoke-on-Trent – with kids or without!

Its links to some of the world’s most famous china are no secret – the six towns which collectively make up the Potteries were at the heart of the UK’s ceramics production – but the family-friendly activities, the fascinating heritage, the hands-on experiences are too often overlooked for anyone planning a weekend break with kids.

Visiting in the run-up to Christmas, we had two days to fill, exploring heritage sites and museums (as well as getting outdoors) – and barely stopped, emerging with a string of festive decorations, as well as getting to discover a unique part of the country’s cultural history.

The first stop had to be the Gladstone Pottery Museum, the last complete Victorian pottery factory in the country – not just a great introduction to the area and its heritage, it was one of the highlights of our 48-hour break.

Once there were thousands of the iconic bottle kilns dominating the skyline: now the four at the former Gladstone China Works are a rare relic of those days.

Gladstone’s own ovens stopped smoking in the 1960s but as you step inside the factory site, reading the strict rules for clocking on at the gate, then emerging in to the courtyard dominated by those towering chimneys, you can get a taste of how it all worked.

Along the way, we discovered some of the world’s most unlikely job titles – a saggar maker’s bottom knocker, a one-legged dancer, a thimble picker, cod placer and fettler. But the reality of the work was much less amusing.

The saggars themselves were heavy clay containers made to protect the china before it was fired, each one could weigh 15kg empty, several times that when it was full. And each would only last for around 30 firings before having to be replaced, with hundreds stacked inside the kiln each time.

The bottom knocker’s sole job was to make the base, which would then be fixed on. And his only hope of promotion was to take over when the saggar maker died.

As life expectancy was only around 46 years, thanks to the pollution from the smoke of those thousands of bottle ovens and the harsh work, that didn’t always mean waiting too long.

Watching videos made during the early 20th century and walking through displays and into the bottle ovens themselves, we traced the journey of a single piece, grateful we had never had to oversee the complicated process to heat the kilns as high as 1000C over several days – and even more grateful we had never had to step into these ovens, still searingly hot, to carry out the heavy saggars balanced on our heads.

Watching the workers effortlessly craft and decorate, it’s easy to forget just how tricky it is. Right up until the point where we got to try it ourselves.

First, my daughter’s attempt at making a pot – once I explained to her that ‘throwing’ a pot didn’t mean chucking one across the room. Flushed with success, we headed off to discover how models were made in the moulds, before trying to make a poppy by hand.

Then on to some decoration, resulting in a slightly psychedelic cat and a brightly coloured snowman to get us feeling festive. The museum also has a Victorian Fun Day, and other Christmas activities including a Snowman Trail, carols evening and chance to make Christmas cards.

There’s so much to discover, it’s impossible to recount it all – the jars of minerals and pigments to create the different colours, discovering just how astonishingly translucent bone china is, and a rather fun exhibition on toilets through the ages (the pottery factories didn’t just create cups and saucers).

As my daughter tested out the interactive quiz, giggling at the raspberry sound for every wrong answer, and I looked nostalgically at the avocado bath suite I remembered from my childhood, we realised three hours had passed.

Which just left time for a stop for oatcakes in the café – another Stoke tradition, they’re closer to an oaty pancake than the biscuity Scottish oatcakes, and delicious with bacon or cheese.

If we needed any reminders of just what could be conjured up from basic clay, the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery was the place to go. The cauliflower teapot I remember from my childhood is still on display – in fact there’s a whole array of cauliflower creations, plus a pineapple – but that’s just the start.

A magnificent ceramic peacock dominates one room, created by Minton, while Ozzy the Owl dates back around 300 years.

We weren’t only hunting for animals of course, although with a collection of 667 quirky cow creamers, a display case of 300 mugs with pottery frogs inside, plus several bears, we weren’t short of fun pieces to catch my daughter’s interest in the 5,000-strong collection.

With a six-year-old leading the way, there’s never enough time to pore over every case, but the museum’s trail was a fun way to get her hunting as we wandered. It’s a simple one so you needn’t spot a specific piece, which is helpful for younger ones – finding a bowl, for example, really didn’t take us long here!

Having marvelled at the gold decoration on some pieces and the impressive dolls house based on nearby Barlaston Hall, complete with miniature Ozzy, we headed to the temporary Winter Wonderland exhibition.

All the pieces have been inspired by winter, from a Wedgwood jasper candlestick to Spode’s Christmas Tree design, creations featuring characters from The Snowman, a penguin to join our haul of animals, and a more recent Emma Bridgewater design – that factory is not far away either, and runs its own tours and decorating sessions.

The Potteries museum is also home to some of the Staffordshire Hoard, more than 3,500 artefacts from the 6th and 7th centuries unearthed near Lichfield – the largest treasure of Anglo-Saxon gold and silver objects discovered to date.

You can also see pieces from the Staffordshire Hoard in Birmingham at the Museum and Art Gallery, as we discovered on a weekend break in Birmingham

Pieces are on display in various permanent and temporary exhibitions across the UK, with some loaned worldwide, but there is gold enough to wow any age – not to mention a few bones, and the chance to dress up.

The natural history galleries had yet more animals and a few options to stop and play, before more games and the occasional interactive exhibit as we wandered through archaeology, local history, and the chance to model bonnets in the design gallery.

If I had thought seeing these spectacular ceramic creations might help me the next day at World of Wedgwood, as soon as I got my hands on my own clay, I could only marvel all the more at the skill involved.

The lump I was attempting to turn into my pot kept trying to fly off the wheel and had to be rescued several times, before going distinctly wobbly and needing emergency trimming.

Finally subdued into a basic pot shape, I decided it was safest to stick with a simple finished style – Minnie, meanwhile, with her extra day’s experience chose a wavy outline from the six suggested options.

Hers is apparently destined to become a vase, I’m plotting to paint mine and put a plant in: because they are fired, they’ll be able to hold liquid – unlike my daughter’s first and more fragile pot from Gladstone Pottery Museum which will remain purely decorative.

Having been shown up by a six-year-old behind the potter’s wheel, perhaps I’d show more talent dreaming up my own design in the decorating studio?

To ensure I felt suitably creative, we went via the World of Wedgwood museum for another dazzling dose of inspiration.

Minnie followed the miniatures trail and I marvelled at the variety on show while secretly picking my favourite to take home: the collection is so uniquely valuable, it’s protected by Unesco.

Visit during the week, and you can take a factory tour too, in order to see the pieces being created. My jaw still drops when I remember apparently casual swirls and dabs of a brush resulting in those intricately hand-painted designs.

The majority use transfers these days, but having applied them (wonkily) to various plates and bowls when I was little, I know that’s not as easy as it looks either. 

I was counting on that extra experience paying off though, as we headed over to make our own transfers (pausing only to let Minnie paint a few Christmas tree decorations).

My small artist scorned the idea of using a pre-drawn pattern or copying one of Wedgwood’s famous designs, and instead set about imagining her own personal design ‘flower garden’ on the sheet of paper provided.

I know the limit of my own artistic talent, so stuck to colouring in an outline – the only question was how much gold to use, and whether it was a dragon or phoenix. We even got to finish them with our own personalised backstamps, the creator information you find on the underside of plates and cups.

The designs complete, within a few minutes they were transformed into transfers and submerged in warm water, the paper backing falling loosely off so that we could slide them on to our plates, the colours popping against the glossy white.

If they couldn’t match the elegance of the china used for Wedgwood’s afternoon tea or the intricate swirls of the Christmas tree baubles on display, I felt part of centuries of pottery-making history. We’ve certainly never had a travel souvenir quite like it.

Need to know: Stoke-on-Trent with kids

Also known as the Potteries, the six towns of Stoke-on-Trent are Tunstall, Burslem, Hanley, Stoke, Fenton and Longton – Gladstone Pottery Museum is in Longton, while the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery is in Hanley. World of Wedgwood is a short drive away in Barlaston, not far from the Trentham Estate.

Entry to Gladstone Pottery Museum costs £8.50 for adults, £5.95 for children aged four to 16. A family ticket costs £25.50, and there’s free parking next to the site.

Activities include throwing a pot, making a ceramic flower or painting a decoration, and have an additional cost of £1-3. You can also buy painting kits in the shop to take home, and there are extra activities throughout the year – click here to see what’s on.

The museum is open on Wednesday to Sunday , closed on Mondays and Tuesdays (excluding bank holidays, when it opens), from 10am-4pm between October and March, 10am-5pm from April to September (11am-4pm on Sundays).

The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery is free to enter, children’s trails cost £1, including a planned Christmas trail. It is open seven days a week (except for a short period from December 22 to January 2) from 10am-5pm and from 11am-4pm on Sundays.

For details of events, including children’s activities, click here. The Winter Wonderland exhibition runs until February 17, 2019.

The closest parking for the Potteries Museum is at John Street car park, around a minute’s walk away.

The Emma Bridgewater factory has tours on weekdays, free during November and December as well as decorating studio sessions.

The factory’s Christmas events include lights being switched on on November 24,  family Christmas event on December 1, and other activities including Christmas pottery decorating. Click here for opening hours and details of free parking.

Entry to the World of Wedgwood museum is free, including the children’s trail – completed trails get a prize at reception (ours was a little pottery bauble) – and there is a planned Christmas museum trail.

Factory tours cost £12.50 and are available on weekdays, with children under 12 going free. Pot throwing and plate decorating costs vary, but start from £2.50 deposit plus the cost of the item to decorate. Parking on site is free.

World of Wedgwood is open seven days per week from 10am to 5pm, although the factory shuts at 4pm (last entry 3pm) and is closed entirely at weekends and over Christmas. Pot throwing and decorating also run until 4pm at weekends – check here for full opening times.

You can also explore Hem Heath Woods next door with its nature trail, during your visit.

We stayed at Best Western Plus Stoke-on-Trent Moat House hotel – its meeting centre is set in the 18th century Etruria Hall, which was once the home of Josiah Wedgwood. The city’s only four-star hotel, it’s around five minutes’ drive from the Potteries Museum, 10 minutes from Gladstone Pottery Museum and 15 minutes from World of Wedgwood.

For more ideas and inspiration on what there is to see and things to do in Stoke-on-Trent, check out Visit Stoke

PIN FOR LATER: POTTERY HISTORY IN STOKE-ON-TRENT WITH KIDS

Disclosure: My visit was organised through Visit Stoke as part of the Stoke-on-Trent Cultural Destinations Project, an Arts Council project which aims to grow the visitor economy and strengthen the city’s year-round cultural offer. All opinions on where to visit in Stoke-on-Trent with kids and wobbly pots are my own.

Images copyright MummyTravels

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