Erica Tung
Erica Tung is a designer maker and material researcher based in London. Her work is driven by her curiosity about the fundamental properties of ceramic materials and specifically the relationship between ceramics and glass.In particular, she is fascinated by the similarity between the two materials, their intersection of techniques and how they complement each other when placed together.
Frequently in contemporary ceramic practice glaze is used for both decorative and functional purposes. However, instead of applying glaze to her work, Erica dedicates hours to hand sanding and polishing the already fired ceramic surfaces, both after the initial low bisque firing and again, after firing to high temperatures. This is to create a sensually smooth marble stone-like feeling and high gloss finish. Her works are designed to be handled and touched. Through this process, she reveals the beautiful, complex clay matrix and subtle textures that are often hidden underneath the surface.
"My goal is to celebrate the inherent properties and unique material qualities of ceramics, whilst also exploring the intersection of techniques being used to explore these properties. I wish to promote the possibilities and materiality of ceramics and glass to a wider audience. ”
Erica Tung was born in Hong Kong in 1998 and now lives and works in London. She completed her BA degree with a first-class honour in Central Saint Martins in 2022. She is currently working as a part-time studio assistant of Emma Lacey and Celia Dowson, while creating new work in the studio in London.
Goodbeast
Goodbeast is a design and process firm directed by Jesse Bromm and Tyler Archibald that specialises in handblown objects. Each piece is crafted in their provate hot glass studio in Vancouver, British Colombia, Canda located on the unceded traditional territory of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh nations.
Every glass piece made by Goodbeast is designed with an emphasis on simplicity, individuality and sustainability. No two pieces are the same due to their no mold process.
The Crushed Cups and Slate Ashtray are part of their recycled collection which strives to have the smallest environmental impact possible, glass only melted in a mindful manner and as such air does not have enough time to fully leave the molten glass, resulting in a scattering of fine bubbles. These characteristics reveal how the material was once moving and alive.
Florian Tanzer
Florian has been making unique ceramic creations for over 5 years now, the ceramic artist lives out his passion for handicrafts with the hashtag #avaseeveryday, Florian has been creating a vase or a creature every day since 2021.
“When I start I don’t know how it turns out, whether it will remain just a vase or whether I will add a character. I surprise myself when the finished creature smiles at me. I also always process my current mood and it can range from sad, confused to exuberantly happy. It gives me indescribable joy to knead the earthly material and to create something with my hands. Its my very personal way of intangible care, my artistic practice to deal with my mental health issues, I can turn my suffering into something meaningful, meaningful for me and for the viewer. My art touches.”
Baba Tree Baskets
The Baba Tree Basket Company had been preserving the culture of baskets and the Gurunsi community in Bolgatanga for the last 15 years. It’s here that a community of over 250 artisans practice a time-honoured weaving technique using elephant grass and their very own “rhythm and flow”. Each basket comes directly from the hands of the artisan weavers they collaborate with.
Founder Gregory McCarthy started the company a few years after he first took steps in Ghana in 1999 with the significant understanding that good design can and will change people’s lives. The Baba Tree Basket Company continues this ongoing commitment to the artisan weavers they collaborate with through the progressive creation of sustainable jobs, fair and meaningful work and true social impact in the local community.
Each basket is created in Bolgatanga, a remote town in the upper east region of Ghana, otherwise known as the “City of Baskets” by the Gurunsi people, Baba Tree continue to focus on creating income earning opportunities for the Gurunsi artisans they collaborate with.
Valeria Vasi
Valeria Vasi is born from the fascination for the design of objects, sculptures and visual art. Her pieces express the inspiration taken from design and art but they also convey the importance of finding the perfect balance of artistic expression, utility and functionality.
Valeria Vasi’s pieces are hand-crafted in Barcelona which makes each piece unique and authentic.
The Paper Vase is handmade in glass using a technique which makes them appear as wrinkled like a piece of paper.
Tim Teven Studio
Tim Teven is a dutch designer who graduated at Design Academy Eindhoven in 2018. A technical and material driven approach to design together with hands-on way of working allows him to play and create in an experimental way. In many of the works the production process is used as a tool to design and a leading aspect to shape the final outcome and function of the object. Treating materials in an unconventional way to rethink the process of making, allows him to find surprising techniques which then can be translated into a functional yet interesting object. Teven works from his design studio based in Eindhoven founded in 2018, where all the objects are hand made with industrial craftsmanship.
Cyre
CYRE is a sensory-based brand that explores the hyperreal through scent creation and collaboration. Seeking to transform and balance our surrounds.
Every scent begins with a concept - a virtual landscape. One that is built on the notes that inspire it: art, experience, experimentation and the surrealistic; where no idea is off-limits. It is an exploration into design and atmosphere. Unapologetic and utopic.
CYRE only formulates with 100% pure rare plant oils. “We strongly believe that this is the only way to achieve complex and evocative scents.”
The CYRE vessel is hand blown, like water, it is never the same twice and it’s hand made nature means that each piece is unique.
Wiener Times
Balancing on the edge of design, crafts, art and decoration Austrian designers Wiener Times fabricate objects of use with a distinct, elegant style yet edgy. The emphasis is on textiles.The pieces are all created with an intense focus on the crafted detail and are actively questioning and pushing the lines between abstraction and function.
Wiener Times are Susanne Schneider and Johannes Schweiger.
Asp & Hand
Asp & Hand is a glass design and production house creating handmade vessels, objects and custom forms in the Pacific Northwest. The house was founded in November 2017 by married couple Blair and Eli Hansen. Eli trained in the Seattle area for ten years, working for such esteemed glass artists as Dale Chihuly and Sonja Blomdahl before moving to New York State with Blair to pursue his own art career, which he continues to this day, as well as to start their family. Blair, meanwhile, spent fifteen years working at galleries, including Gagosian and Hauser & Wirth, as well as overseeing the archive of the Dash Snow Estate and the art studio of Dan Colen. In 2017, the duo moved back to Eli’s native Northwest with the idea to put art into our simplest, everyday rituals.
Caroline Zimbalist
Caroline Zimbalist is a New York City-based interdisciplinary artist and designer who creates one-of-a-kind works by hand using nontraditional processes and techniques. She works with natural materials as well as gelatin, glycerin and other bioplastics to recreate our future landscape.
Crying Clover
Crying Clover Candles was borne out of experimentations with sculptural forms by LA based artist couple, Sara Gernsbacher and Patrick Walsh.Colourful, hand drawn, oil-pastel paintings are folded into rectangular moulds and filled with reclaimed wax from candles sourced at local thrift stores. No two are the same.
“I liked the idea of making sculpture for everyone and stepping outside the commerce of the gallery system,” Gernsbacher.Each candles imperfect checkerboard design, which Gernsbacher likens to the windows of skyscrapers, comes in unique colour ways, part candle part artwork.
Peter Miles
Peter Miles is a British graphic designer and art director based in New York. When he’s not designing mouth-watering beach towels inspired by the weekly circular at Key Food, he creates logos, brand identities and campaigns for Marc Jacobs, Céline, Gabriela Hearst, Isabel Marant, Proenza Schouler, Repossi and more. Peter enjoys the best colors, perfect fonts and playing the piano.
Goest
Goest Perfumes are a fragrance house in Los Angeles, California offering candles and bath/body products with unisex fragrances and an intuitive aesthetic.
Each scent is uniquely composed to work with, not against, the scent of the human body, with internal structures that mimin the effect of living things and real scenes.
12thirteen are please to introduce candles & the Hand Wash Duo exclusively to the UK.
Noe Kuremoto
Noe Kuremoto is a ceramic artist who makes everything by hand using simple tools. She’s known for playful sculptural work that takes the form of functional wares. Her pieces mix child-like simplicity with contemporary sophistication, and incorporate her background in Fine Art and design with her cultural heritage.
She shares the traditional Japanese view that sprits are everywhere, especially in nature – for Noe the truth of our universe can be found in wilderness. Her signature piece is a single flower vase - an ‘Ichirin Zashi’, which invites the sprit of nature into people’s homes in the simplest form possible. It’s representative of her desire to make a deeper connection in a world that can often feel shallow. “The single vase comes from my deep ocean of childhood memories, I hope every piece I make helps my son to see the world as a beautiful place.”
Basalt
Handmade in small batches Basalt Lip Care hails from Seattle, Washington.
Named after a fine-grained, startlingly beautiful form of igneous rock, Basalt offers a collection of fuss-free skincare formulas designed to streamline your beauty routine. Each of their products are handmade, use all natural ingredients, and are never tested on animals.
Basalt’s monochrome packaged Lip Balms are enriched with Vitamin E to repair and strengthen skin while beeswax protects against the elements, for the softest, healthiest lips. Each Balm will leave your lips feeling hydrated without any tacky or greasy feeling and paired with their Lip Care Routine dry lips won’t stand a chance.
The Lip Balm is available in 3 varieties - ‘Original’, ‘Sweet Mint’, ‘Blood Orange’.
Each Lip Balm is only further enhanced using the Basalt Lip Care routine - ‘Exfoliating Lip Scrub’ and ‘Lip Masque’.
Myrza Deva
Myrza deva was founded by Myrza de Muynck in 2017 she uses a 3d printer to create ceramic accessories and homewares. The pieces are mostly designed by cut up garments and pieces of cloth that are immersed in a composition exposing intimate and human characteristics.
“There is a juxtaposed interaction between the hard technical precision and repetition of the printer and the soft and malleable handmade shapes and character of the clay. The objects celebrate anthropomorphic play, sensations and emotions, pleasure and contemplation. The soft shapes and colourful prints emphasise a feminine and intimate world encoded”.
Piera Bochner
Brooklyn based artist Piera creates handmade, unscented candles moulded from exotic fruits and vegetables poured in brightly coloured layers, each sculptural candle is uniquely coloured and highly detailed and makes for a truly unique centrepiece.
“I am an artist and designer based in Brooklyn, NY. I studied fine art at Oberlin College and in addition to my studio practice, I work as a printmaker in Soho, NY. My artistic practice spans a multitude of mediums and merges ideas of function, craft, seriality, and ritual. The creation of candles entered my practice through my obsession with the material of wax. I began by incorporating wax into my work as a surface or texture, but felt as though I was neglecting the breadth of its functionality, so I began to explore the possibilities of candles. My idea was to create a candle that evoked ritual and mystery — a candle with a form that surpassed the ubiquitous, steadfast shapes of pillars and tapers. I decided to explore new shapes by choosing pre-existing forms that intrigued me, like romanesco broccolis and bitter melons, and casting them to make the candle moulds. To make the candles I create different coloured waxes, which I individually melt and pour into these bizarre and haptic moulds, causing the layered effect. By hand-pouring every candle myself, I can control and investigate how wicks, wax, and flames travel down the new, unconventional paths I make for them. I find that all the different mixtures of wax colours combined with the melting power of the flame creates endless variations of the original form. The candle becomes both a functional object when its purpose is enacted, but also an ever-changing sculptural form when inert. What I find particularly engaging about creating a functional sculpture like my candles is that whoever decides to take one into their home and claim ownership over it has the ability to determine the fate of its form. By choosing to light the candle or leave it be, they control the final outcome of its decay and what the form will become”.
Adam Ross
Adam Ross studied Ceramic design at the Glasgow School of Art, graduating in 2009. Relocating to London in 2015, he now makes tableware and sculpture from his studio in Wood Green.
"Evidence of process is an important characteristic for me in handmade ceramics. I like to look at an object and visualise the maker and the steps taken to produce the work. This idea, along with my love of traditional handmade pots and the techniques used to produce them are the combined inspiration for my tableware. The work is thrown, then faceted vertically, and cut through horizontally whilst still attached to the wheel. With the wheel still spinning, I carefully begin to open the up the pot from the inside, allowing each section to twist and move independently, leaving every piece unique".
Adam Ross' tableware in 'Tin White' is exclusive to 12thirteen Store.
Akiko Hirai
Akiko's work is a fusion of Japanese and British ceramic traditions, she draws upon traditional Japanese methods when making her ceramics. Her pieces are deeply textured yet utilitarian in form, using rough dark clay to create a veil between the rough layers underneath and the smoothness of the glazed exterior. Glazed in soft whites, greys, greens and natural colours, her forms showcase the thick volcanic glazes that run down the sides or pool on the surface.
Akiko Hirai was born in Japan in March 1970. She initially studied cognitive psychology in Japan and obtained her degree before coming to England. She took a degree course in ceramics at the University of Westminster, then went on to graduate from Central St. Martins, she currently works as Head of Ceramics in Kensington and Chelsea College and works from her studio in Stoke Newington, London.
James Duck
James Duck is a recent graduate from the Royal College of Art having just completed an MA in Ceramics and Glass, his handmade 'Mendax' tableware range is made from porcelain and raw, unrefined red brick clay.
“I make things. Often clay things.
My practice occupies a space in and between conceptual art, craft, design and sculpture. I make various
objects. Some functional. Some expressive. Some conceptual. But all the objects I make come from, and in one way or another, play a role in a larger ideological agenda.
My latest body of work is a tableware range, Mendax: considered, functional, Scandinavian-Oriental it is "faux-honest" tableware. It embraces its making, its imperfect nature, but does so with hidden intentions. It is comfortable and yet challenging allowing for continual reconsideration”.
Martin Pearce
“The development of form is at the root of my work; the interplay of shape and surface creating the individual character of a piece. Non-figurative in nature, the pieces present many points of reference.These may be biomorphic, molecular or perhaps topographical. Ideas emerge during the making of a piece and after completion. I enjoy the ambiguity that this type of abstraction provokes, raising questions for the viewer and the maker.
Working from my studio in the countryside of East Sussex, I develop several pieces at once, building the forms using slabs and coils of clay.The surfaces are finished with layers of slips and glazes designed to ex- press form and character. Many pieces are multiple fired.”