It all started at a restaurant in Geneva, back in 2004.
Martin and I lived in Lausanne (Switzerland) and decided to play “tourist” and spend a weekend in Geneva (like 40 minutes by train from Lausanne … like living in New York and going to Queens for a weekend …). Anyway…
At that time, we were already making pottery – Martin was lifting 50cm cylinders and I had already moved on to handbuilding (as Martin was advancing much faster than me with the wheel and this annoyed me enormously).
We had a pottery studio called “LePot”. And we had 2 lives: our day jobs – Martin, CEO in a packaging company, and I, a textile trader at IKEA – and at night and on weekends we managed our studio.
Let’s go back to that restaurant in Geneva: with a glass of wine and a paper tablecloth, we started drawing what we thought would be a WOW! project – live 100% of the pottery, in Barcelona. With full belly and many more red wine glasses after, the ideas flowed non-stop (some of them freaking crazy, I must say).
The change was radical: work, home, country, culture, from raclette to ham. But we both craved for adventure, so we jumped in the pool (without a float).
And in January 2007 we opened ElTornBarcelona. So, we turned 10 years old. We have matured our business concept, we’ve learned to work together (Martin is my husband), we’ve grown from 100m2 to 500m2 of studio size. Much has changed since that first draft on a paper napkin, but the essence remained: we wanted to offer a space where we could enjoy pottery.
Today we’re a school; we’re a space where students and ceramicists (locals and internationals) develop their works; we’re a group of ceramic lovers who share ideas and projects. All happening at the same time.
We offer weekly classes, week-long courses and workshops. We share ideas, motivate newcomers to the ceramic world, celebrate joys (like opening the kiln) and support each other on less joyful moments (like opening the kiln). If you make pottery, you know what I’m talking about!
We also join amazing projects, such as “Diagonal 11”, which took place at our studio back in 2016, during the 47th International Symposium of Ceramics, held in Barcelona. Click here to see the video.
The truth? We’re very happy Martin and I, for having been completely crazy in throwing it all away and starting a new life linked to ceramics. Happy to dare to leave the black (safe) and pass it to the orange (creativity and adventure).
Because life starts beyond your comfort zone. You have to jump into what you are passionate about. Because we only live one life (or at least, one at a time … well … I’ve been listening to audios about multiuniverses, where they say we have several lives at a time …. Maybe it’s a topic for another post :-).
