This page leads you through the history of Argyll Pottery. Click on the thumbnail images on the right to view larger photographs.   Click here to see photographs of the pottery being built, and the kiln rebuild.

1987

I will always be grateful to the Finches for taking me on as Apprentice, Joe and Trudi are immensely talented artists and so I feel very privileged to have worked with them at Appin Pottery (they are really nice people too). When Joe said they were thinking of selling up I could have seen it as a big problem but I decided to try and set up on my own.

I started looking around for somewhere to build a new place and to cut a long story short was eventually able to get planning permission and the finance (I`d like to thank Penny Cousins for making my business plan a lot more accountant friendly) to purchase the land that Argyll Pottery now stands on, just a few miles down the road from where Appin Pottery was. (Thanks must also go to Ewan and Carrie McPherson for agreeing to sell me the land). During the planning stage it was great fun working out how to arrange the workshop and gallery.

1988

We have been in the business of Craft Pottery Manufacturers and Suppliers here at Argyll Pottery in Barcaldine since the spring of 1988. D, Carmichael & sons and Kirsop & McLeod built the pottery just about on time an only a wee bit over budget. Pam, Hugh and I put in some very long hours decorating, building and generally cleaning up after the electrician, plumber etc just so that we would be ready to open.

We opened to the public on the 6th of June. (Made lots of pots.)

1989-1990

Year of the big storm, the wood we used for firing the kiln was at that time kept under tarpaulins and you guessed it the wind tried to rip them off, even though we could not afford it, I decided we needed to make some form of cover so we built the wood racks. The storm also knocked down one of the beautiful Scots Pine trees out the front, which make up our logo. (Made lots of pots!)

1991

Needed more storage space for unfired pots so built extension to kiln shed, Hugh dug out space for the clay store and we laid the foundation concrete slab. (Made lots of pots).

1992

Built new clay store, I usually hate flat roofs but as we had found the concrete slab so useful for drying pots on the previous summer I thought we could do a decked area. (Made lots of pots.)

1995-1996

Got Sandy and Eddie back to build extension to the pottery, doubled workshop space and added utility room and storage space for unfired stock. It was rather expensive so had to try and cut back on other costs, this had a regrettable consequence, as I saw less relevance of the Ceramic Review magazine at the time and among other things I cut my subscription to it just when Ron Wheeler was starting to collate his great book, Winchcombe Pottery, The Cardew-Finch Tradition, so we missed his call to anyone who had worked there! (Never mind we did enjoy making lots of pots in our bigger workshop).

1998

The old kiln had done a grand job but was at last beyond my abilities to patch the fire boxes any more so we started a new, as the old one based on Joes` interpretation of the Olson fast fire kiln worked so well we only tweaked it a wee bit where it had let us down, so (and here comes the anorakish bit) We laid the inner heavy bricks on the flat not their edges as we have been known to stoke just a bit too vigorously, I had to renew the fire boxes recently after nine years of service, they still held out really well as we didn't have to dismantle the whole kiln to do it. We also added self flushing fire boxes that Joe recommended; these are great I cannot recommend them highly enough. (Thanks Joe). I spray glazed inside the chamber with Jane Hamlyn’s new salt kiln glaze, it is to line and protect the kiln and create better salting so I thought it might stop the ash being sucked up by the new kiln bricks too much, it worked a treat. (Thanks Jane). (Made lots of pots for our nice new kiln.)

1999

Got planning permission for the house but a clause in it stopped me getting a mortgage. (Thanks Planning Department!) So I got the foundations in. (Made lots of pots.)

2002

Finally persuaded the bank to give me mortgage after spending rather a lot on getting that clause in the planing consent changed (thanks again Planning Department they do know how to be an avoidably expensive pain in the - , well I wasn`t going to say neck and it`s not too near it either!) but we eventually got to do the house. As it was what they call a self build it was not all plain sailing as you can imagine, but I can appreciate not living in the goldfish bowl that was the flat above the pottery. (No coach parties peering in). Tried to make lots of pots but had lots of finishing to do on the house. Moved in on the 19th August and started to sort out the flat to turn it in to workshop space for the Porcelain range so that we can increase our contemporary out put, something I have wanted to do for ages. The Porcelain body is based on an early recipe by David Leach which he kindly gave me on one of the four times I met him, (a genuinely nice bloke). This version is a bit higher firing than his more well known one but dare I say it- nicer to throw with, we have tweaked it a wee bit as the ingredients we can get and the temperature we fire to are a tad different (but I`d like to thank David which ever fluffy cloud he is potting on now). We also have space to do evening classes in the winter too, something people have been badgering me about for a long time.

2003

Hugh and his partner Carol have a bonny wee baby boy called Findlay! When asked if they thought he would want to be a potter, they both said no he is going to be a lawyer or some thing so he can keep them in their old age. Hugh has to make lots of pots (babies are expensive).

2004

At last came out of the dark ages and bought a computer, got David to build us a web site! And made lots of pots to help pay for it all. I also started to do some more of my contemporary pieces as with the large SPA exhibition Clay in Bloom.

2005

Hugh and Carol had another wee baby boy called Ewan! And Hugh put in for planning permission for a house up the Glen. We also built a new Wee Piggyback Kiln, aprox`8 Cft which sits on the flue of the big kiln and tried to get it to work as a gas/wood/soda kiln, a second chamber and just a gas kiln, it sort of does all but the straight gas kiln bit at the moment but it needs time to tweak a wee bit. (Better to make lots of pots, we know as Hugh keeps saying that babies are, "awful expensive").

2006

Hugh's house is at last being built. Also we seem to be getting noticed for more of my art ceramics now which is great as it is nice for me to be asked to have a go at a few different shapes (example Argyll Boxed Collection, An - Tobar, and Solo exhibition in The Leith Gallery) as well as making lots of (useful) pots.

2007

We had to refurbish the wood kiln which means we took it down to rebuild the fireboxes one of them had a crack across the lintel and the back of the other box was moving into the flue a wee bit also we turned most of the white HTI bricks that make up the chamber around so that they don't face the ferocity of the flame straight from the fireboxes. Also re-roofed part of the kiln shed at the end of the year. (Made lots of pots - we really do like making pots you know).

2008

Well it's 20 years since we started making pots here and I have to say it doesn't feel like it! I think we will be continuing to re-furbish some of the out buildings this year, I did think when we made them the first time they might last me out but it seems that they don't make Ondulean to last like Corrugated Iron! (By the way the kiln shed has always been roofed with iron where it sits over the kiln as Ondulen might melt). I hope to keep up with the more individual pots and Hugh is obviously aiming to produce a five aside football team as He and Carol have another wee baby boy called Callum.