Large Plate Making Using a Slow-Speed Pottery Wheel with Shinsuke Iwami
- Duration: 5 Days (approx.)
- Location: Coromandel Town, Waikato
Join renowned Japanese potter Shinsuke Iwami for a five-day immersion into large plate making using a slow-speed wheel technique. This workshop is as much about mindset as it is about method.
Iwami-san's approach is considered, deliberate, and deeply respectful of the materials at hand. As he describes it, the wheel can be walked around rather than spun, and the work will be no less complete for it.
Over the week, participants will gradually build skill and confidence, starting with small plates and working steadily up to large-scale forms — learning trimming techniques along the way that are essential to working at this size.
Day 1: Making a wooden rib, shaped to suit your own hand and way of working
Day 2: Morning demonstration, followed by making small plates
Day 3: Trimming small plates in the morning, making medium plates in the afternoon
Day 4: Trimming medium plates in the morning, making large plates in the afternoon
Day 5: Making large plates in the morning, trimming large plates in the afternoon
Participants are asked to bring a piece of wood for shaping their own rib on Day 1 — it doesn't need to be large, and a reference picture will be provided. If you're unsure, Driving Creek will have some wood on hand.
About Shinsuke Iwami
Born in Tokyo in 1964, Iwami-san graduated from Tama Art University in 1989 before moving to Mashiko in 1995 to study pottery, where he established his own studio in 1998. His practice has taken him around the world — from building an anagama kiln at home in 2002, to spending 25 months across several years on a ceramic support project in Cambodia, to gathering local materials and making pottery on Bornholm Island in Denmark over the past decade.
For Iwami-san, pottery is a way of exploring how to live — drawing on what's immediately at hand, working with as little stress as possible, and sharing what he discovers with the people who eventually hold his work. This workshop offers a rare chance to learn that philosophy directly, alongside the technical skill behind it.
