Go Back Kiln Firing Without Furniture: Exploring the 'Zero-Batt' Option in Studio Production
This practice-based paper explores the possibility of firing ceramic wares in a studio kiln without the use of refractory batts and conventional refractory props, both of which constitute important kiln furniture. It relies on the author\'s studio experiments to demonstrate the methods and procedures by which this will be possible. The paper proposes that when batts are excluded from the firing process, ceramics studios can be established and run without being weighed down by the high cost of refractory batts. The need for the exploration of this \'zero-batt\' possibility was not borne out of doing it for doing sake but in search of how ceramics studio establishments can be more cost-effective, especially in a harsh economic environment in which potters in Nigeria (and in other countries whose economies are wobbling) operate.