Blooming Crystals: An Extraordinary Shower Installation

I have always loved traditional glazes from Asia and in 2012 I had a client who shared this appreciation.

My client was building a home on the Connecticut coast about 50 yards from the beach. She wanted a large group shower with 2 adjacent bathrooms for her large extended family to use for changing and rinsing off before and after going down to the beach.

After looking at a wide selection of glazes and designs, we decided on this Chinese crystalline glaze and nicknamed this space the “spa shower”. This is not my glaze recipe but with crystalline glazes, there are so many outcomes you can get with one glaze depending on how you apply and how you fire it so in the end you have a glaze that is unique to your methods.

It's worth mentioning that this client has a great aesthetic eye and is a true appreciator of design, art and craft. She loves being involved in the process of creating with me or anyone else she is working with. We’ve done a few projects together over the years and working with her always challenges me to make something better than I could have on my own.

All glazes have some crystals in the chemical makeup but not all are designed to “flower”. For this to occur a special glaze recipe is required in addition to a very controlled firing process during which the rate of temperature increase is mapped out and different temperatures are held for hours at a time to enable to crystals to grow and develop. It’s a careful and slow firing process to say the least.

Our kiln room:

The concept was to create a painting using this filigree glaze in a check pattern with an extraordinary white that has yellow and lavender undertones that peak through. The checker brightens the mood and creates a rhythm within this organic composition. Given that this room is windowless, light and brightness is very important.

It was more powerful to mix tiles which have fully developed crystalline flowers along with some tiles with the only partially developed crystals - a sort of snow storm look. We developed a different firing program for the snowy look and used the variations in this traditional crystalline glaze to create a contemporary yet timeless look.

To create the “painting”, we took the hundreds of tiles we made and lay them out outside to look at what we had. Next we moved them around to create an abstract composition that evokes patterns and images from nature. Each tile is numbered so that the installer could put it together as the painting we created.

It was a very long day and and we were in the wee hours when we finished the layout and numbering.

But as always, every bit of work was worth it- these rooms feel absolutely magical to be in. The combination of pattern, movement and intricate detail in the design is mesmerizing. One can enjoy the composition as a whole or get drawn into a detail.

Walking into the shower:

Inside the spa shower:

The adjacent bathroom:

The inside a medicine cabinet in which we only used the “snowy” glazes:

A fun fact is that this house was finished just before hurricane sandy hit in 2012 and it had absolutely no damage even though it is located right on the beach! Well-made houses do well even in devastating hurricanes.

PS. Thank you Steemians for the warm and generous response with my introduce yourself post, you really know how to make a newbie feel welcome!