The Craft
The craft might best be described as the magic place where new ideas get mixed together with traditional materials and processes. Often, and without trying, we see old things in new ways, we see familiar things differently. These great moments can only happen in the studio, and you have to be there to coax it along.
In the year 2000 when we opened our doors, my goal for Derby Pottery and Tile was to create a workshop /studio and showroom in which to make and sell my products. For decades, I have always loved and collected “Things with some history”, and overwhelmingly, it was Architectural salvage that remained well represented in my collection.
Once I moved to New Orleans in 1996, the collecting continued, and the studio took shape. The first 5 years were in an industrial warehouse. I was also quite committed to my new appointment as a professor at Tulane University. Teaching has always been a component of my professional practice. In time the tile business established itself. Since 2000, the business has thrived in a storefront studio in the historic destination shopping area of New Orleans named simply "Magazine Street ."
The pottery and tile we produce today is generated from the greatest examples from my years of collecting architectural salvage and ephemera. The Patterns used on my tile is the exact same pattern that was used on my circa 1890 Late Victorian bi-fold hinged dressing screen. New discoveries are ongoing and welcomed.
