The Leach Pottery is excited to present an online exhibition of wood-fired pots by Ellie Woods. This unique collection comprises pots made during her New Zealand residency augmented by pieces fired in Cornwall, with Ellie’s practice being inspired by the relationship between clay, function, and firing.

The lion’s share of the New Zealand pots were fired in the Driving Creek Phoenix kiln, with many of the pots coming from the final experimental firing which was slowed down to enhance the surfaces and textures. Ellie also fired a small number of works in the anagama kiln built by Bruce and Estelle Martin in Hawkes Bay.

Ellie brought her New Zealand pots home in her suitcase, then worked alongside them in her studio for several months. Over time, Ellie absorbed and responded to their forms and surfaces, subsequently honing a responsive body of work. These ‘reflections’ began by working with different clays throughout 2025, the resulting pots being fired alongside John Mackenzie in his wood-kiln in Cornwall.

Ellie says:

In New Zealand, I worked in a more considered way because I had the time to explore: I dug and used my own clay, working with darker deposits from Driving Creek and a light clay from the other side of the Coromandel Peninsula. The resulting pots embody these clays and how they behave when thrown and altered.

Ellie has been exploring the spontaneous surfaces, colours and effects, of wood-firing since 2022. This journey took her to New Zealand, in 2025, for a three-month artist residency at Driving Creek Pottery: a site visited by Bernard Leach and currently the home of ex-Leach Potter Callum Trudgeon. During her time at Driving Creek, Ellie worked on a Leach kick wheel alongside a kick wheel designed and made by Barry Brickell.

Ellie will soon be taking maternity leave and the Leach Pottery looks forward to her return in 2027. She graduated from Liverpool John Moores University with a Fine Art degree in 2018, started an Apprenticeship at the Leach Pottery in 2021, and joined the Studio as a Production Potter in 2024.

The exhibition is online only.
All works for sale.

More details to follow