Chiang Mai is alledgely the artisan capital of Thailand - where potters, woodworkers, weavers and the like do their work and ship it across the country and the world. So naturally, that was our first stop.
This Siam Celadon factory.
Celadon is this smooth green glaze, famous in Chinese Ceramics, but also developed here in Chiang Mai and once dominated the world.
Once all handmade, today, just a few of the pieces at Siam Celadon are hand thrown and hand carved. As we walked into this pristine factory, we saw two of the master throwers....
It seems the men work on the wheel, while the women carve, attach handles...
and do the final cleaning and refinement of the work.
Today, the original vessel is handmade - and hand carved... but then a mold is made and the pots are jiggered.
This worker is "jiggering" or making a reproduction of the original bowl.
And another worker cleans the rough edges on a small banding wheel.
The workers are so quiet, working away, shyly smiling at us... but suddenly a bell tolls... the 3pm break is here and everyone runs out side with smiles and laughter!
Tom gets in with the crowd as they buy fresh fruit and vegetables from the vendors who drive up just in time for the worker's half-hour break.
It's a fast 30 minutes... then back to work.
Next stop... the master mold makers work in another room. This room is all men, designing the molds that will be used to go into the jigger. They tell us we can bring any item to them and they can create a mold for it and presto.,,, you can easily and cheaply duplicate the work.
A view from outside the studio...
And back to the women, finishing the work that has been glazed.
Finally, the big kilns. 4 large gas fired kilns run today on computer, in the past, manually run on gas, we believe, though it may have been wood. This is a very large and very sophisticated factory, making most of the celadon consumers see coming out of Thailand.
Next time you're in a japanese or chinese restaurant and see this well-known look - peek underneath the foot. If it says made in Thailand - or Siam Celadon - these are the people and this is the factory in which it was made. Next stop... a pottery village where all the work is hand made and the kilns are in the backyards of people's homes!
No comments:
Post a Comment