SECOND Bird Model: Great Blue Heron

This listing is for one Great Blue Heron bird model. It is made of stoneware ceramic, nichrome wire (kiln wire) and glazed with various colours of underglaze as well as coloured and clear glaze. As you can see it is a very delicate item, so it should be treated care!

Please Note: this item is considered a “second” quality piece because of:

-there is a crack where its wing meets the body on the back of the heron (see photos), but not too noticeable

What is a “second” item? An item is considered a “second” quality item if it has some small flaw in its finish, that doesn’t affect its use. It could be a fault in the glaze like pinhole (tiny hole) or rough patch/bubbles in the glaze. It could also be a fault in the actual clay body where there is a hairline crack but it has been glazed over. Usually these flaws are not too noticeable unless you are very closely inspecting the item. These flaws are considered in the pricing of the item and a fair discount is applied to these items! I describe the exact flaws in the item description and include photos that show these flaws as best as I can. Please always inspect the photos before purchasing the item.

The Great Blue Heron is my favourite bird, I often spot them flying over head during morning/evening walks or standing near rivers/creeks near my home. I sometimes even see them flying over the neighborhood from my studio! I'm so pleased to finally intersect my love for birds and ceramics!

I have workshopped the firing method of these little bird models over the last year, the main issue is that the fine wire legs are not able to support the weight of the body while in the hottest part of the glaze firing in the kiln, so the birds would keep slumping over! And using thicker wires really doesn't have the same delicate effect as a finer wire. This led me to insert a wire hook into the base (the lump of clay the bird is standing on) and hang it upside down in the kiln (on a rig) so that it keeps the bird nice and straight while firing. I then cut off that wire loop from the bottom of the bird model (that's why you can see 2 small wire dots at the bottom of the base!)