My Story

 

 Hi, Im Susan Weiner, the maker of all things ceramic on this site. I have lived in western New York my whole life, I am in my mid 50’s and came to pottery in my early 40’s. My professional life consisted of 32 years of engineering, construction, inspection, project & contract management. I worked on airports, highways, colleges, city streets. I was introduced to pottery classes by my super creative neighbor, I was hesitant, pretty sure I didn’t have a creative bone in my body. I did enjoy remodeling our home, interior design, gardening, had done a bit of sewing, explored photography & watercolor painting in my early 20’s but didn’t have a passion for any of those (except maybe gardening). Pottery was different, I fell in love! After several years of community classes in a great studio with excellent teachers I realized I wanted greater control over the process. I never felt like I had enough time in the community studio to do what I envisioned. I started to envision my dream job and pottery was definitely a part of it.

In my early 50’s I began to realize I had to make some serious life changes, my high stress job was making me ill & miserable. I had been thru cancer, lost both my parents and felt the pain of being an empty nester, it was time to take care of me. So I quit..ahem, retired. I didn’t think my pottery could really be a sustainable business for me, but if my pots could be good enough for some people to enjoy  & that would support my “habit” that would be more than enough to make me happy. Well three years later I have surpassed my original goal, I have found a style to my work, I have a small studio of friends and co-creators who bring me joy & with each year I have found ways to connect with the people who enjoy my work and it brings me great joy. As long as I am happy creating I will keep doing it & I truly am grateful for anyone who has my pieces in their home and life.