Down a ways from little central Landenberg, in a converted olden-day schoolhouse nestled in a wooded hill within a walking distance from the roving, burbling White Clay Creek, lives a potter named Jenny Wood.

She works out of a tiny room that contains little more than a table and chairs, a pottery wheel, piles of clay, and some simple tools. But when she enters that sparse room to work on her pottery, she and every object she touches comes alive. The space becomes electric with energy, an epicenter of sparkling creativity. It is the spot where Jenny simultaneously loses herself and feels most present, in touch with the marrow of everything.

“There are endless possibilities with clay,” she exclaimed. “I love to just continue to evolve.”

Jenny Wood discovered her life’s work when she signed up for a pottery class in 2012 while living in Austin, Texas. The studio was down the road from her sons’ preschool, so the class seemed a good way to while away time until she had to pick up the kids.

“My first pieces were terrible,” she said with a laugh. “But I didn’t care, I was amazed with the process and the fact that I had made something.”

Jenny and her family eventually settled in Landenberg, and she is not the first potter to call this locale home. In the early and mid-1700s, many potters put down roots in Landenberg because the area is rich in white and red clays, from the aptly named White Clay Creek and Red Clay Creek. Potters were in high demand because people during this time period before the Industrial Revolution depended on them to supply drinking and eating vessels and bricks.

After the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, in the early 1800s, pottery factories with large-scale, gas-powered kilns that utilized Landenberg clays existed throughout Chester County. Also during the 1800s, kaolin, a type of clay that forms from millions of years of granite decomposition, was discovered and harvested from Landenberg’s hillsides. The kaolin was transported to Philadelphia, where it was shipped to England to produce fine china.

A book, “Potters and Potteries of Chester County, Pennsylvania” by Arthur E. James, first published in 1945 and republished several times since, chronicles over a hundred years of pottery history in Chester County. This book has been the bible of pottery research nationally, and it has inspired other writers to document the pottery history of their regions. The book is filled with humor and local anecdotes, so it makes for enjoyable reading for both potters and non-potters alike.

In more recent years, a very famous potter, Bernie Felch, lived in Landenberg. In fact, his home and studio were right down the street from where Jenny lives now. She never knew him, however, because he died before she moved to the area.

In addition to being a potter, Felch was also a painter, sculptor, and ceramist. He served as chair of the Fine Arts Department at Lincoln University in Oxford for 21 years, and he taught pottery classes and workshops all over Pennsylvania and Delaware. His clay creations have been exhibited in museums, corporations, and universities, including West Chester University. Two of his large-scale brick works are part of the permanent collection installed in the Delaware Art Museum’s sculpture garden.

Upon learning that Jenny Wood is a local potter, Felch’s daughter Lindsey gifted Jenny with some her father’s clay-working tools. Jenny said she cherishes the tools, and she gets a warm feeling every time she uses one of them.

“I feel a sense of connection with this other person who did the same art right where I live,” she said.

When asked which aspect of pottery she loves the most, Jenny replied, “I love everything about it, starting with visualizing a piece, then the feeling of the wet clay in my hands, and especially, the rhythm that develops when I’m working with the clay on the wheel.”

She explained that she ascends into a rhythm when she repeatedly throws the wet clay onto the bat (a flat disk that sits on top of the wheel), and that rhythmic sensation continues as she centers the clay and shapes it into an object.

Jenny said the next part of the process is to let a piece air-dry a bit for one or two days, and then she trims and refines it and sometimes adds some underglazes or designs. Seven to 10 days more of drying must take place before the piece can be fired in the kiln. She said this natural air-drying process is very important.

“If a piece still has moisture in it, it will blow up when I fire it in the kiln. Not only will that object be destroyed, but the shattered fragments might ruin other creations that surround it in the kiln,” she said.

She added, “There is a lot that can go wrong with pottery. A potter has to learn to become very comfortable with failure.”

Jenny said that although a piece is typically sufficiently dry after 10 days, it takes about six weeks before a greenware piece (an air-dried but unfired piece) makes it to its first firing (called a bisque firing) in her kiln. She prefers to fill the entire kiln with greenware before she fires it up.

She fully loads the kiln for several reasons. First, she can run it less often if it is filled. Her particular device is very expensive to run because it uses a lot of electricity. Second, the less often she runs the kiln the less likely it is that she will have to replace one of its inner coils (referred to in the business as “elements”). They too can be expensive. Third, running a kiln involves a huge time investment. It remains running for up to 13 hours, and it requires “babysitting.”

Jenny explained what she means by babysitting. She said, “For the type of clay I use, cone-6 stoneware, that first firing needs to reach a temperature of 1,945 degrees, and the second firing, the glaze firing, will go all the way up to 2,232 degrees. Depending on the type of clay a person uses, optimal firing temperatures might be higher or lower, but the kiln is always going to pose a potential safety hazard if a person doesn’t keep an eye on it.”

Due to safety and investment concerns, Jenny recommends that people new to the art of pottery wait a while before purchasing their own kiln.

“I would recommend people start off by learning how to work with clay and becoming familiar with the various glazes and underglazes before they think about purchasing and operating their own kiln. That’s what I did,” she said, “For years, I just took my air-dried pieces to local pottery shops for firing. There is a steep learning curve to learning how to use and maintain a kiln properly, and that knowledge must be attained in a series of baby steps.”

It is likewise true, she said, that there is a point in which an artist, in order to expand and grow, is going to desire to possess their own kiln. She bought her kiln during the pandemic, but only because so many pottery shops had closed down. After slowly learning how to put the kiln together and how to maintain and operate it, she eventually became skilled enough to begin experimenting with different temperature ranges. She discovered that varying the holding times of temperatures resulted in a whole new world of creative outcomes.

“For instance, once I had my own kiln,” Jenny said, “I discovered that if held a glazed stoneware piece at its highest optimal heat level for five or 10 minutes, rather than letting it reach peak and then immediately cool down, that method slowed the cooling process and resulted in interesting “drippy” effects on my stoneware, and customers really like those effects.”

Before one of Jenny’s pieces can be deemed “complete,” she often embarks on a secret and time-consuming glazing process. One clay vase used 12 layers of glaze, and each layer was fully air-dried before the next layer was applied.

It is a process, she said, that takes days. But the results proved that the time spent was well worth it. The vase had a rainbow, glass-like sheen to it which was quite pretty.

The final step in Jenny’s process is when a batch of glazed pieces go into the kiln for the second time. And once again, she keeps an eagle eye on the heating process.

When the glaze-fire temperatures go down to a point in which the kiln is cool enough to open, Jenny said, “It’s like a holiday! It’s such a great feeling to take out all those pieces that took weeks to make.”

With all the skill, materials, time, and expense that goes into making a piece of pottery, it’s little wonder that one of Jenny’s mugs can cost a patron upwards from $40.

“My prices are probably in the standard range for clayware mugs, and people are more than happy to buy them. Many people really appreciate the value of a handmade piece. And they like the fact that they are buying something that is one of a kind. No clay piece can ever be precisely duplicated --- there are just too many variables involved,” she stated.

During my visit with Jenny, she served me kombucha out of one her stoneware mugs. It is a drink of which I am already fond, but I can state with certainty that it tasted even better out of one her mugs. I would describe the flavor as being a little more robust and earthier.

That experience led me to question Jenny as to why her clays are designed to make good drinking vessels while some other clay products have a warning that people should not drink from them. She explained that she uses a mid-fire clay, which makes for good food- and drink-ware. Some clays, she explained, like terracotta, are low-fire clays, meaning they naturally must be heated at low temperatures. Since they are fired at low temperatures, they remain somewhat porous and moisture retentive, making them great for use as planters but probably not so great for use as drinking cups.

Jenny said, “If people want handmade drinking and eating vessels, they should ensure that the clay used is of a type that vitrifies (hardens) at mid-fire and high-fire ranges and inquire whether the potter indeed fired the pieces at those high-heat levels.”

Jenny sells her mugs at the shops Rooted in New London, Pa., and Newark, Del., Purple Robin in Lilitz, PA, and The Landenberg Store in Landenberg. She displays a photo album of her processes and pieces on Instagram at Jennywoodarts, and she said people are welcome to contact her there if they see a piece they would like to purchase. She also has a website titled Jennywoodarts.com.

Her pieces are also sold at various market shows held throughout the year. Recently, she was a featured artist at the Artists of Landenberg Studio Tour. This show, which enabled people to visit the studios of local artisans, including not just potters and ceramists, but also painters, jewelry makers, and textile designers, was widely popular. It was so well-attended, it will continue on as an annual event. The next studio tour will take place Oct. 12 and 13 this year.

As Jenny Wood said, “There are endless possibilities with clay,” and she hopes to explore them all. One day, she would like to experiment with using the local wild clays and perhaps try her hand working with different types of kilns. She may even offer some pottery classes in the future. But for right now, she plans to explore, quietly and exuberantly, all alone in her lovely studio in the woods, the fascinating realms her stoneware clay and electric kiln have to offer her.

Jenny’s list of the best places to take pottery classes:

Community Arts Center in Wallingford, Delaware County (Jenny’s favorite)

Centered Clay Studio, Kennett Square, Chester County

The Chester County Art Association, West Chester, Chester County