Connecting with the clay

When Mike Owen creates a piece of pottery from a lump of clay, he often thinks of one of the greatest compliments that anyone has ever given him as a potter: “I think of you every time I have a cup of coffee.”

“I make things with the hope that they are going to get used,” said Owen as he sipped coffee from one of his mugs that didn’t quite come up to his sellable standard. “I am happy just to hear that my customers are happy. But one time I received a letter from a good friend who wanted a coffee mug designed to his specifications so it would fit in his truck’s cup holder. He wrote to thank me and also told me that he thought of me every time he used the mug.”

That unique connection keeps Owen from thinking about his work at South of the Moon Pottery as anything but a typical nine-to-five job. 

Owen grew up in Cape May County and met his wife Susie when they were in high school. He credits her for running the business side of his pottery studio, which he operates out of a converted garage at his home in West Cape May. The finished products are sold out of The Madd Potters’ Studio at 324 Carpenter Lane in Cape May and at Fathoms at the South Jersey Marina.  

His introduction to the world of pottery started when he was working for the county in the buildings and grounds department. One of his assignments was the facilities at Cold Spring Village, where he struck up a friendship with the village’s resident potters Harry LaBov and Jackie Sandro. 

“I had never done anything like pottery before,” said Owen. “But they were really quite inspiring and so talented at what they did.”

The creative bug bit him and Owen has been covered in clay dust ever since. 

After a year of soaking up knowledge from LaBov and Sandro, Owen said, he was asked to fill in giving pottery demonstrations when the two experts returned to their day jobs as local teachers. 

“I was a nervous wreck,” Owen remembered of the moments before his first demonstration. “I was pacing, going over what I had to say and convinced that I was going to mess something up.”

But when he sat down to work at the potter’s wheel and the curious onlookers gathered around, Owen says that all the nerves fell away. 

“I just spoke from the heart and started to work like I always did,” he said. “You could have heard a pin drop, people were that absorbed. I had to look up a few times to make sure they were all still there.”

From that first demonstration, Owen continued to work at the village for four more years, where he would sell the items he made at the country store. 

“That’s where I first fell in love with pottery,” Owen said. “To be honest, I didn’t care if I sold anything. I just wanted to keep doing it.”

Owen said he would create pieces for friends and family, but he joked that they were under obligation to say they liked his work. It wasn’t until strangers started appreciating his pottery at craft shows that Owen realized a pottery studio wasn’t a far-fetched idea. 

After the boost of confidence from the craft shows, Owen converted his garage to make room for a pottery studio and his surfboard collection. 

“About five years ago, I moved the lawn mower out and moved the kilns and potter’s wheel in,” he said. 

A trip to a shop in Cape Hatteras, North Carolina gave him the inspiration for his studio’s name. 

“It was a place called Over the Moon. I was trying to be clever and said that we weren’t over the moon, we’re south of the moon,” he said. “Well, enough people liked the sound of it and the name stuck.”

His favorite time to work is during the evening, when the day’s obligations are done. He cranks up his music, decides on his pieces and gets to work. 

“I start with a plan and a piece in mind,” he said. 

For example, in one evening Owen said he would create, or “throw” six or eight of his popular coffee mugs and then something extra to satisfy his own creativity. 

“I rarely come out here and just make one piece,” he said. “I have the customer orders but then I always find time to get in something different too.”

He likes creating practical pieces like bowls, cups and mugs as much as he likes experimenting with sculptural pieces. He even enjoys tackling the more challenging pieces, like items with fitted lids or teapots that require at least four or five separate parts. 

He starts by working a lump of clay in a spiral motion, a process that keep the pieces waterproof. Next, he centers the clay on the potter’s wheel. The ball of clay should look even, and be rotating evenly, like the wheel of a car, when viewed from the side. Then he uses both hands firmly against the spinning clay to open it and pull it into its general shape. 

“Every piece of pottery starts the same way,” explained Owen. “It doesn’t matter what you are making.”

After the clay is thrown, Owen lets it dry and trims off any excess the next day. From there it heads to a kiln to be fired, called a bisque fire, at a temperature of about 1800 degrees Fahrenheit for around ten hours. 

Owen then sorts the pieces and methodically cleans his work area in preparation for the glazing process. Then it’s back in the kiln for a glaze fire at 2100 degrees for another ten hours. 

He said he lets the heat do most of the work when it comes to the unique designs. By far, the most popular color on his glazing shelf is blue.

“If you want to make a potter laugh, ask them if something comes in blue,” he said. 

Owen said that he’s made mistakes along the way. Sometimes it is a piece that doesn’t adhere to the clay correctly. Those items never make it to customers. Once, he made a $2000 mistake when he stayed out surfing for too long and pottery exploded in the kiln. 

To Owen, even with the occasional mistakes work is not only fun, it is what keeps him centered – a process that is as important to people as it is to a spinning clay. Centering forms the foundation of the piece and if your clay is not centered when you begin to pull up the piece, it will be off balance, he explains. 

His retirement from his county job last April has given him the time to devote to the studio and become a better potter. 

“My goal is to spend more time out here,” he said. “Besides, I’m not really one to stop working.” 

Currently he is working on a kid’s product line called Cala Baby that is inspired by his granddaughter. The line includes cups, plates, bowls and tea sets that are designed for small hands. 

In Owen’s opinion, the potters of the art world are special in that they are always ready to share techniques and learn something new. After all, he noted, pottery is one of oldest art forms and something that no one person can claim as their own. 

“A potter will share their secrets in a heartbeat,” he said. “If I know of a better way of doing something, I’ll tell someone about it.

“It may be new to me, but working with clay is an ancient art and there is always room to learn something more,” he added. “That’s how this art form was learned, by teaching one another.” 

Owen teaches classes, limited to about four people, in his studio. 

“Most people, what they know about pottery they know from television or movies. And yes, I hear references to the movie Ghost all the time,” he said. “But after someone can touch the clay and work with it, the process really gets under their skin and you can see people starting to learn to love it, just like I did.”