Hannah Melnyk Makes

Hillier studio offers colourful pottery creations

Hannah Melnyk got her hands into the pottery business while she was still in high school. She built up her community hours by volunteering at David Drown and Maggie Murdoch’s Wellington Pottery on Consecon Street. “Everyone who knows pottery knows it’s a messy business, so they had me cleaning the house and the studio so they could focus on pottery,” says Hannah. “Then every year during the summer they would bring me back. At first it was cleaning the studio, then it was to work on an extruder—like a giant Play-Doh press— where David would guide the pieces and then cut them.” During her university years she worked summer jobs as a waitress in Wellington at the Tall Poppy, but also spent one or two days a week at the pottery studio. Following university, she was living with her sister in Mississauga and wondering what to do. “I majored in Victorian literature and I was a little lost, to be honest,” she says. “David and Maggie invited me back to Wellington to stay in the guest suite in the winter and help out in the studio. In the summer they created a mini-room for me to stay in. I was young and I had about four jobs at the time and I worked for David and Maggie for room and board. I lived there for four years, working at the pottery. I got to do late nights in the studio and I helped them with shows and workshops.”

Hannah learned her pottery skills over those years. “Dave and Maggie would bring out a piece and put it on the table and say ‘Why did that speck happen?’ or ‘What did the glaze do?’ and I would watch them use their pottery master skills and I got to witness and learn. They were really good with me, answering all my annoying questions, and they would encourage me to try and experiment and learn. That was the best teaching I could ever have got, really,” says Hannah. They allowed her to start her own line of products in their studio and her first show was at Arts on Main. She also showed her work in local markets as well as at the Busy Hands craft show. She was commissioned to make a line of cider cups for Loch Mór Cider.

Instead of a potter’s wheel to shape her pieces, Hannah uses a mould. She rolls out a slab of clay to the desired thickness and then forms it to a mould, and the resulting piece is then fired in a kiln. She still uses moulds from her days at Wellington Pottery as well as designing her own. She says that almost anything can be used as a mould, and shows some small cups that were derived from an egg carton. Her colourful pottery pieces are glazed with glazes created by David Drown. “Colour brings me joy and a lot of different emotions. I will have a different favourite colour depending on the day or on my mood. David creates these glazes by hand from the elements of the periodic table. A lot of potters use ready-made glazes. I’ve been spoiled rotten because from my apprenticeship I’ve been using these glazes that have been tested for 30-plus years, and they are tailor-made to the actual clay bodies. David is such a glaze wizard.”

Prior to last year, Hannah had been working out of her apartment in Wellington, with half of it taken up as her studio space. Her family had been on the lookout for a better work space for her when a house in Hillier came on the market. With their help, and with the help of her boyfriend’s family, Hannah’s dream of her own studio space became a reality. “It was such a lucky break. I thought it was totally out of the cards for me. It’s a great privilege to have what I have and it’s the artist’s dream to have a studio directly at your home, so I’m very, very blessed.” She opened the studio in April last year and says it’s been a big learning experience. She’s very grateful for community support as well as support from local businesses such as La Condesa, Stella’s, Loch Mór, Broken Stone Winery and The Everything Store. “This community has been so good to me. I want to take a pause and regroup and then start to give back in any way I can. I’m just really grateful and I’m excited to have an opportunity to give back and share that love.” Hannah’s studio is located at 18639 Loyalist Parkway in Hillier. For more information, please visit hannahmelnykmakes.com