I'm a retired teacher turned passionate potter, based in North Shields on the northeast coast. What started as a hobby 40 years ago, has turned into a second career for me after I retired.  It all began with hand building, before developing skills on the wheel. I worked a lot with red earthenware clay and developed design using majolica glaze and oxides.  Now every piece I create is crafted using stoneware or white earthenware clays, mainly hand building using slabs, coils and moulds.  I love constructing forms and shapes with clay in various states and usually rely on decorating techniques rather than glazes. Decoration for me is the most important part and I get much inspiration for it from my interest in printing and textile design. On stoneware clay I use colour slips to decorate, either in a very fluid way with brushes, or sometimes more precisely using the sgraffito technique. On white earthenware clay I apply vibrant coloured underglazes to create designs, inspired by textiles, the Northumberland coast and countryside, as well as photos taken on my travels to Central Asia, Japan and New Mexico.  All my pieces are finished with clear glazes, and no two are ever the same.