Join esteemed ceramic artist and instructor Sunshine Cobb for an inspiring exploration of hand building, from foundational skills to next-level techniques.

In Mastering Hand Building, discover a robust array of options for constructing both simple and complex clay forms without a potter’s wheel. Richly illustrated with color photography, this comprehensive volume includes:



Essential techniques in hand building, covering pinch pots, coil building, and slab building
Advanced techniques and tips for designing templates and replicating pieces, lidded vessels, using molds, a variety of decorative techniques, and other avenues of exploration
An overview of kilns and firing schedules, plus slip and glaze recipes
Slab-building and molding templates for creating plates, bowls, cups, and boxes
Artist features and inspirational galleries, including work from today’s top working artists, such as Bryan Hopkins, Lindsay Oesterritter, Liz Zlot Summerfield, Bandana Pottery, Shoko Teruyama, Courtney Martin, Sam Chung, Deborah Schwartzkopf, and many more


Take your hand-building skills—and your artwork—to the next level with Mastering Hand Building.

The Mastering Ceramics series is for artists who never stop learning. With compelling projects, expert insight, step-by-step photos, and galleries of work from today’s top artists, these books are the perfect studio companions. Also available from the series: Mastering the Potter’s Wheel, Mastering Kilns and Firing, and Amazing Glaze.