Bouchet Agateware Pottery in Saint Ouen, Jersey, United Kingdom | Pottery

Bouchet Agateware Pottery, Saint Ouen, Jersey, Channel Islands, United Kingdom

Bouchet Agateware Pottery, located in Saint Ouen, Channel Islands, crafted by a secret process known only by one man, the only agateware Pottery in the world and one artist?s quest to produce what was hitherto considered impossible. This makes Bouchet Agateware a delight to both the discerning collector of ceramics and the souvenir hunter.

Agateware, the reproduction of natural agate stone achieved by marbling white clay with metal oxides, is a Pottery form that has fascinated and tested the skills of may potters since the first century AD in ancient China.

Experts and those with a special interest in Pottery may well say agateware has been made before. Very valuable examples of this Pottery form can be seen in museums and much is in the hands of private collectors. All of these pieces can be considered rare but, at the same time, most are fairly crude and flawed. This is the reason why potters were not encouraged to go on to perfect a procedure for the manufacture of agateware.

In 1969 Tony Bouchet form Bouchet Agateware Pottery and took up the challenge to be the first potter to successfully produce and perfect what must be the Holy Grail of Pottery.

Now as he looks back over 30 years of dedicated work he can see why agateware has never been successfully produced before. In short, it is almost impossible to make. At every stage of development normal Pottery practice had to be abandoned and new ways that could cope with the complexities of the Pottery had to be developed.

Numerous new techniques have been developed by Tony, some so advanced that they have never been used before. Colours have been formulated and mixed - the mixing process alone required over 2000 experiments. This does not include the formulation of a new clay body structure (mixed on the premises), an innovative mould making system, the forming process, drying, glazing and firing techniques ? all of which came about only after years of experimentation.