W

HEN I first moved into Brunswick 30 years ago, you could still encounter factory workers having a smoke in the bluestone lanes. The hum of machines was eventually replaced by the sound of builders as new apartments emerged out of old factories.

But I still come across remnants of this industrial past, such as 160 Victoria Street. What was “Cool Fashions” textile manufacture in Victoria Street is now the “Hot Fashions” collective of art and craft studios. I had walked past this nondescript site hundreds of times, but it was only by visiting the potter Sophie Moran that I learned about the remarkable activity within.

Sophie takes me on a tour of the various painting, photography, design and ceramics spaces. At the end, we come across new tenants who make specialist tools for potters—surely a sign of a healthy clay ecology.

Sophie Moran is a model successful potter. She has a loyal clientele that sustains a production practice that stays true to the ideals of local handmade. And she has nearly 50,000 Instagram followers. How did she get here?

Like many of her generation, Sophie began with an arts degree. But it left her looking for something more creative. In the mid-1990s, she found a class in ceramics at Melbourne University: “When I did the short course in it, it just clicked.”

She rented a space for a year to teach herself before going to study ceramics at Box Hill TAFE.

“It just opened my mind to all the techniques.”

She was particularly attracted to the rustic look, inspired by Peter Rushforth.

In her journey, she continually returns to the authentic value of hand and clay. For many years, she was part of Northcote Pottery, including its move to Weston Street, East Brunswick. Initially, she adapted to their new equipment: “I could only have an electric kiln.” For a while, she went porcelain.

Then she took a workshop in Collingwood. “I went full circle and came back to more stoneware finishes.”

Sophie Moran’s workshop

She then moved her workshop to Victoria Street, Brunswick, in 2017. “Initially I loved this warehouse because there were interesting people that worked in other mediums. There was a really good work ethic.”

In this creative milieu, Sophie couldn’t help but explore new techniques. She started experimenting with more refined processes. “I had this intense moment with some really labour-intensive techniques of colouring porcelain and inlaying white clay and clear glaze. I took one out of the kiln and it looked like a melamine plate from the $2 shop. I was just like, what am I doing?”

Ironically, refining her skills had removed the mark of the hand from the work.

For a while too she was finding demand for her work difficult. She stepped up production to supply retail outlets, but that too removed much of the hand from her work. “I was a bit of a machine.”

She has now settled into the low-tech faceting that distinguishes her work. “I love repetition, I love production, but I want each one to be unique.”

Today, Sophie sells exclusively online, but only within Australia. Most of her sales are to return clients.

Her work can be found in homes across Australia. Many of us are currently cradling one of her cups, enjoying the faceted texture, each dent individually carved by Sophie in her workshop, tucked inside Brunswick’s industrial past.

Visit www.sophiemoran.studio

This article was originally published on‘Culture Makers’, a newsletter written by Kevin Murray.

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