Fleen Doran Soap Dish – FDSGJ

From her workshop in the Forest of Dean, Fleen Doran produces both wood-fired salt glaze and hand-thrown porcelain. Alongside potting, Fleen enjoys gardening and cooking and so her wares are suitable for everyday use.

Fleen’s Salt Glaze pots are thrown and altered on the wheel or built up from folded slabs of clay. Her decoration is simple but effective, using hand made wooden or clay stamps to impress leather hard clay. Fired to Stoneware temperatures, her pots are sturdy and long-lasting.  The glaze is formed when salt is introduced into the kiln; the sodium from the salt reacts with silica in the clay body or slip to form a sodium silicate glaze. The kiln is cross-draft and wood ash is carried from the fire box through the kiln where it melts onto the pots. The nature and joy of wood-firing is that each firing is slightly different, making the surface of each pot unique.

Fleen first started throwing Porcelain pots with Ledbury based potter, Stuart Houghton. Together they developed a simple range of porcelain pots for the table, kitchen and oven. In 2017, Fleen took this range under her own name as Stuart started to focus more on his own one-off pieces and woodwork. The pair still enjoy a potting catch-up in Ledbury, where Fleen often hosts pottery workshops.