Leather-hard teapot

This teapot was hand-built out of coils. You can still see the coils on the outside - they have been smoothed together on the inside to increase strength and make the teapot watertight.

The spout is a slab bent into a circle and you can see on the bottom of the spout where the slab edges overlap. The lid is a slab cut into a ring with some coils (not shown) on top to make a dome on the lid. Three short coils are attached to the underside of the lid to help hold it steady on top of the teapot.

The term leader-hard refers to the fact that the teapot is still drying - it is now about dry enough to have a leather-like consistency, but is not fully dry.