Visiting the Wedgewood factory - Part 2
Josiah Wedgewood grew up in a potters family and in 1758 opened his own shop. His popularity grew over the next 20 years and he never stopped experimenting with different materials and techniques or improving his already innovative products. The famous blue wedgewood colour comes from a special clay mix including colbolt. He trialed 3,000 variations over 3 years before coming up with the desired colour.
Going around the factory we saw all of the stages of production. Some of our favourites were seeing the ornamentation's created by being pressed into a mold, then "waggled" out again using a special tool, then carefully applied to the pottery by hand. Some of the items were fired 7 times before they were finished. After each stage quality inspections are made. For limited edition pieces, if they are imperfect in any way, they are smashed and the process starts again (Last week for example a $14,000 Pegasus was broken and trashed).
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Going around the factory we saw all of the stages of production. Some of our favourites were seeing the ornamentation's created by being pressed into a mold, then "waggled" out again using a special tool, then carefully applied to the pottery by hand. Some of the items were fired 7 times before they were finished. After each stage quality inspections are made. For limited edition pieces, if they are imperfect in any way, they are smashed and the process starts again (Last week for example a $14,000 Pegasus was broken and trashed).
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