Nuka Glaze

Since we just came through winter and have been burning the fireplace a lot, I decided to take our fireplace ash and make some glazes out of it.  Some of them still need some work, but the Nuka glaze is already pretty promising.  Here's an example:

The Nuka glaze I made has a very simple recipe:

• 1/3 washed wood ash
• 1/3 Kona F4 feldspar
• 1/3 silica

It is pretty thick and gloppy, because I didn't want to put my ash through a fine sieve - I like irregular, splotchy, runny glazes that are interesting to look at!  But the interesting thing is that it goes onto the bisqueware really thick - like 1/8" or more.  Thankfully it doesn't run too much, so you can get away with this.

Here are the test tiles I made with the Nuka glaze.  These are pure Nuka on B-Mix and Dark Brown test tiles:

The glaze is very rough and craggy, and very matte.  Curiously, the glaze seems to break black on the sharp edges on the B-Mix tile.

Nuka and Tenmoku are a classic combination, and this glaze certainly didn't disappoint in that arena!

This is much more what I wanted - a nice, runny, creamy white glaze.  It seems that the tenmoku is just enough to flux the nuka and create a wonderful combination.  The brown flecks in the glaze are just fantastic.

Once I saw these results, I tried the nuka glaze on a couple of cups I made, over tenmoku, of course.  Here are a few more pictures of the best one.

Of course, I will have to keep refining these glazes, but this was a result worth sharing!