Reflections on a Wood Firing
The Collective Effort
It begins with a match. A rotating crew keeps watch for 10 days and nights, stoking the flames, gauging the temperature by sight and feel and sound. The kiln breathes, and those tending it fall into its rhythm.
Firing an anagama is not a task for the solitary potter; it takes a village to succeed. The work is relentless, the fire unpredictable. For weeks beforehand, potters become loggers, trees are felled, wood is hauled, split, and stacked, a mad scramble for enough pine and oak to last a week of constantly feeding the beast. Days of placing pieces, thoughtfully, carefully; negotiating where in the kiln may create just the right effects to each pot, trying to predict the path of the flames and ash, hoping that we can guide this force.
These hours forge bonds that extend beyond the kiln. It’s the kind of work where small moments stand out: the brief intensity of a large stoke, the gentle flick of a log into the kiln, the handoff of responsibility between shifts, the shared silence when all there is to do is listen and watch.
An anagama firing isn’t about control; it’s about experiencing true creative freedom. The flame does what it wants. We can only suggest what it will do. The ash drifts and lands where it will, glazing pots in ways no brush could replicate. Every firing is an act of surrender, letting go of perfection and trusting that the kiln will leave its mark where it’s meant to.
Those who have done this before share what they know—what wood burns best, when to push the fire, when to let it settle. But each firing is unique and challenging - you must evolve and take risks to succeed. The kiln encourages you to trust your own senses - it tells you what it needs, experience helps us understand.
And when it’s over, when the kiln is finally cool and unsealed, what remains is more than our finished pots. It’s the culmination of skill, and stories, and risks, and experiments, and friendships, and arguments, and trial, and error, and success, and patience, and hard work, and us. The kiln is silent, but the memories linger, etched into the cracks of the anagama itself.
