Mockingbird Pottery was founded in 1994 when potter Mike Henshaw built a Japanese-style noborigama wood kiln in rural southwest Georgia. Using a modified plan of Will Rugle’s and Douglass Rankin’s, the kiln was designed to burn cast-off wood scraps from local sawmills. The kiln reaches stoneware temperatures of 2250 degrees F in 18 to 24 hours. The fuel is a mix of southern yellow pine and local hardwoods.

The pots themselves are high-temperature stoneware—food-safe, dishwasher-safe and microwaveable. Clay and glazes are mixed by hand and formed either on a foot-powered wheel-- or by assembling slabs.

“My studio in Southwest Georgia is probably one of the few potteries in the United States that has no electricity or running water. Based on the rural Japanese potteries of the 17th and 18th centuries, my kiln-side studio is truly primitive—and I hope that spirit of simplicity carries into my pots. I have parted with the old ways, however, with the use of a modern chainsaw and a pair of Coleman lanterns.”

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