The following is a complete list of the clays, slips, underglazes and glazes I use in my studio. As with everything else in ceramics, you have to test things in your own studio to see if they work with your materials. These are a mixture of things I have created, borrowed, or learned from previous experience with peers and educators.
Clay ready to be thrown.
Clay
The clay body I created in graduate school fires beautifully to Cone 6 and is a deep, dark brownie color. I currently use Highwater's Earthen red clay, and it is very close in color to what I mix on my own. At this time boxed clay is the best option for me. I fire the clay to a hot Cone 5 in my kiln, if you get this clay too hot it will bloat in the kiln.
Sara's Cone 6 Clay Body
OM4 10%
RedArt 45%
Fireclay 45%
Bentonite 2%
Grog to taste (I usually only add a scoop or two to the first batch then not at all.)
Slipped teabowls waiting to be decorated.
Slip
I've been using this all-purpose slip recipe for years. It's stable and fits any clay body I have ever put it on. It looks beautiful low fired and midrange on my pots, and it is also what I used on a high-fire clay body to woodfire in graduate school. It accepts colorants beautifully, and, when thinned-out, pours lovely as a liner or for exterior coverage. I use a little epsom salt if I get it too thin.
When I color my slip I usually mix two full buckets of it at a time. For our studio and the use, that’s normally 25,000 grams. We leave one 5 gallon bucket thicker, like the consistency of yogurt, and the other we thin down more like the consistency of whole milk. The thinner one is then divided up into pint sized yogurt containers, and colorant is added to them. For a full size yogurt container I add between 2 and 3 tablespoons of mason stains.
If for whatever reason I have it a little too thin I will add a few pinches of epson salt and mix it up until I feel like I have it exactly the color I want.
All Purpose White Slip Cone 04-10
OM4 25%
Frit 3124 18%
EPK 25%
Silica 20%
Zircopax 5%
Pots waiting to have the exterior dipped in glaze.
Glaze
I use the same two glazes every firing and add a thinned out lithium wash in certain areas to add movement to the glaze. These glaze surfaces each change dramatically with a slow cooling cycle programmed into the kiln's firing schedule. I don't slow cool now, but have in the past and they both get a much more matte surface.
EM Satin Glaze (from Eric Mirabito via Chandra DeBuse)- Cone 6
Silica 21%
Neph Sy 20%
Whiting 20%
EPK 20%
Frit 3124 20%
Bentonite 2%
Add: 4-6% Mason Stain for color
lithium wash
(lithium carbonate 9.5g + Bentonite 0.5 g + 2TBSP water) to select areas to encourage running. Use sparingly on upper 1/3 of pot. Not the insides!
Alberta yellow ^6 (warm honey yellow color!)
Gerstley borate 17.65%
Nepheline syenite 21.86%
Alberta slip. 35.10%
Flint/Silica 23.46%
Soda ash. 1.96%
When I was in graduate school we used this recipe in cone 10 reduction and in the wood kiln and it’s beautiful! The higher it was fired the more light honey it became.