NO.17 1690 CERAMICS: UP OUR STREET - 8 Holland Street's neighbours, near and far

Sophie Wilson's 1690 Ceramics was conceived when she opened a little shop in her Lincolnshire home, "it was the kind of place where I imagined Ron Weasley's mother would go for her essentials, a Diagon Alley-style shop with lotions and potions". A desire to sell local studio ceramics led her to pick clay up again for the first time since school; "perfection doesn't interest me at all,” she tells us, “that's the difference between photographic realism and abstract art - I like to see my influence on the clay." 

Matisse is a huge inspiration for Sophie, particularly his interiors, which express a joy in living, in colour and in disrupted pattern: "there are always ceramic objects in Matisse’s interiors paintings - I wanted to step into one of them and come back with the object." This idea has been central to the styles of her Famille Verte and now her new Satsuma ware, created – and anticipated – with much excitement for us at 8 Holland Street. 

Sophie's old manor house home-cum-studio in the middle of a bustling village is important to her work too, 'I can see anything I make in this house before it goes anywhere else; I can see myself living with it, using it, admiring it". Sophie’s ceramics always have a certain practical and durable quality and aesthetic to them, "my work is made in a very actively lived in home - before anything leaves the house it's soaked and steeped in family life. Its upbringing in the house is its foundation before it leaves and goes anywhere else."

But for all the comings and goings of village life, an imposed stillness and a quiet routine, once her children are at school, leaves Sophie with the perfect working environment; with light streaming in through the kitchen windows, she’ll set to work. Clay in various stages of production is dotted around the house, "the children know to gently move it away to make space for their dinner." In Sophie's world everything seems to be living and breathing, the clay and the house included, "what I've made for myself here is something really beautiful and positive that no one can change."