Hand building workshop at Strandskovgaard on a beautiful winter day: Ceramics & Brunch

My friend Line and I held a workshop together in her beautiful green farmhouse in Denmark this winter. Her farmhouse, or "the farm" as she likes to call it, is an old traditional Danish four-building farm that Line and her husband are lovingly restoring back to life. The farm is called Strandskovgaard and it is going to be used for workshops, retreats and gatherings. Line is a seasoned workshop host and has held many cooking class workshops both privately and in her professional life for large companies like Whole Foods, IKEA and others.

We gave her green farm its inaugural send off this winter, when we hosted our very first workshop there.

Here is Line with her dog Emily, ready to greet you when you come for a visit.

The workshop building is in the final stages of being finished, so Line graciously let us take over her dining room for our workshop.

I made ceramic tool kits for everyone, which everyone could take home afterwards if they wanted to continue their ceramics journey at home.

Here we are ready for our workshop. All systems go.

While I was in charge of teaching the workshop, Line, who is one of the best cooks I know, made brunch for everyone. She set up a table with some snacks to greet everyone. The lemon cake was my favorite and in fact Line had to bake an extra one on the fly because the taste testing got a little out of hand before the workshop. That's all I am going to say about that.

And while I didn't carry the watermelon ("I carried the watermelon?"), I did contribute by grating the lemon topping and chopping the cashews for the cakes. I am helpful like that. Let me know if you get the watermelon reference.

Then we sat down for the workshop. I demo'ed how to do a pinch pot and I showed various pinch pot ideas. I had brought samples of pinch pots and some books.

We talked about all the things to think about when working with clay. For the next hour, everybody made a pinch pot that they could let set up while we had brunch.

Deep concentration co-mingled with great conversation.

Then we broke for brunch.

Take a look at what Line made for us. We had Spanish tortilla, Phyllo crust with asparagus and mascarpone, roasted vegetables, green salad and a beet and orange salat with Feta crumbles. Everything was just so delicious.

After brunch we continued our work. I gave another demo on how to make handles and other attachments. I talked about strategies you might use to make sure your attachments stay, um, attached. I talked about how to roll out a slab and how to avoid cracks. After another couple of hours, everyone had made some beautiful pieces. Here are a few.  

After the workshop, Line took all the pieces to be fired and glazed, then brought them back for everyone to pick up. Take a look at all the fabulous pieces that were created on this wonderful winter day in Denmark on Line's green farm. I can't wait to go back!

Lines green farm is on Instagram: @strandskovgaard and so am I: @ahomeforceramics

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