Their stories begin similarly: They were passing by the studio on the way to here or there and, pulled by some memory of working with clay, decided to wander in.
Then, they just kept coming back.
Through months or years of exploring the clay, of learning its give and take, each became a potter by rights and the potters became a collective.
Now, five days a week, an assortment of the 28 potters can be found in the EarthStar Pottery studio, rolling, shaping, stamping and glazing clay under the tutelage of owner Barbara Lane. Some of them sell their work in the gallery in front of the studio, a warm, whimsical space connected to the North Hartland Post Office. Others have no goal but to create. Most are still finding their way around the medium that sparked their curiosity.
“Clay has a mind of its own,” Carole Kitchel Bellew, of Piermont, said on Thursday morning as she pieced together leaf-like shapes to make a votive candle holder.
“It teaches you how to let go,” added Mindy Schorr, of West Lebanon, who was making a mug stamped with a floral design.
Schorr is a retired nurse midwife. Kitchel Bellew has worked as a sculptor, jewelry maker and publisher. Other members of the collective include a waitress, a restaurateur, retired teachers, a former social worker, a retired priest. A few had experience as potters before they started coming to the studio. Several were artists in other mediums. Many had never worked with clay outside of school art classes.
Lane, who worked as a potter in Washington, D.C. and Lynchburg, Va., started the studio along with former chef John Quimby in 2007, after moving to the area to be near her daughter, son-in-law and twin grandsons. She lives behind the studio and shares her kitchen with it.
Her small gallery displays a mix of functional and decorative pieces, in styles ranging from utilitarian to playful: cream pitchers in tilted shapes, bowls of every size and color, a turtle with an intricately sculpted mask as a shell. The pieces are all hand-built rather than thrown on a wheel, allowing for an endless variety of shapes.
Originally, Lane led workshops for the potters who came to her studio sessions. Over time she changed her methods. “The more I get out of the way, the better,” said Lane, who is no longer taking new potters into the collective but loves showing people around the space and explaining the process. “I’ve learned to be quiet until they come to me.”
Quiet was a distinguishing feature of the studio on Thursday morning — there are designated quiet periods built into the studio time — but it was a companionable quiet, bubbling at the edges.
“It really is a welcoming space for everybody,” said Candace Crosby-Rogers, a retired special education teacher from Quechee, who was rolling out clay to make one of her signature bowls with circular cut-outs.
“It’s a refuge from the world,” said Leonard Rahilly, who taught French at Michigan State University and now lives in Hanover.
Like many of the others, Rahilly simply dropped into the studio one day out of curiosity. After six years here, he’s still a bit mystified by the clay. “Everything is iffy,” he said, as he applied a glaze to a square trivet.
Joie Finley, of White River Junction, is starting to get the hang of things after an unknown number of years of coming to the studio. The former homeless-outreach worker makes beer tasting mugs — small vessels that people can wear on a lanyard around their necks at beer-tasting events — and butter dishes in unexpected designs. Her VW van butter dish has been such a hit that she keeps having to make more.
Lane has enjoyed watching Finley grow as an artist. For a while, Finley had no interest in displaying or selling her pieces, but recently, that changed.
“All of a sudden, she’s producing this amazing stuff that two years ago she didn’t know she could do,” Lane said.
Affirming as it is to sell her pieces, that’s not why Finley comes to the studio every Thursday. “I suffer from a mental illness, and this is my therapy,” she said. “When I come here, it takes me out of my bad brain.”
It’s not just the creative process that provides therapy, it’s the friendships that form around it. The potters share clay, ideas and stories. At studio sessions, they inquire about who’s missing and why. Sometimes a group of them meets up for dinner. When someone needs a ride or a dog sitter, someone else always steps up.
“I love seeing these people,” Finley said. “I look forward to Thursdays all week long.”
EarthStar Studio is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday, 1 to 4 p.m. and by appointment.
Sarah Earle can be reached at searle@vnews.com or 603-727-3268.