DIRT CERAMIC STUDIO

There’s a new kind of alchemy unfolding at the edge of the forest, where mist clings to the hills and the old farm supermarket stands with its stories etched into crumbling walls. The sign is still faded, but something else is beginning to bloom here. You feel it before you see it - something tactile, earthy and alive.

Dirt Studio, like a mushroom after the rain, has emerged with quiet intent. It is the creation of Jean Dollery, a ceramicist, yogi, artist and something of a creative fire-starter. From the moment you walk in, you understand: this isn’t a polished gallery or a pottery production line. It is a space for transformation, for memory and, above all, for play.

‘Everything here is handmade,’ Jean says, brushing a curl from her face with clay-streaked fingers. ‘That’s who we are.’ Behind her, rows of raw stoneware and fired earthenware pieces line the walls, waiting for the next layer of life to be added by her, or by someone brave enough to try.

From the outside, you can still see the bones of the building it once was. But now, the concrete is scattered with colour - broken tiles in blues, ochres, greens and reds. Slowly, they are taking shape on the wall in a collaborative mosaic, a patchwork of stories pressed into clay. ‘It’s a memory of its own,’ Jean explains. ‘You destroy something to create something new…. pottery teaches you to let go.’

She would know. Long before her first formal lesson, Jean was already moulding bits of clay into forms - drawn to the way it yields to touch, holds warmth, remembers. ‘Clay holds memory,’ she says simply. ‘It records your presence, your hesitation, your intention.’ That idea, that clay can mirror the maker, is at the heart of what she is building here.

Inside Dirt Studio, the air smells of kiln-fired earth and incense. Music plays softly, sometimes not so softly, and light filters through old windows onto the working tables. Jean teaches with a grounded sort of joy, encouraging even the most reluctant hands to dive in. There is no right way here, no fixed outcome. It is not about creating perfection, but about finding presence.

‘Adults don’t play enough,’ Jean muses. ‘Especially men. There’s fear there, around creativity and release.’ So she’s created something of an antidote: three-hour classes (two evening and two day sessions weekly), where locals and visitors alike can roll up their sleeves and reconnect with themselves. She puts the music on, sometimes something sexy and rhythmic, other times gentle and meditative. ‘Let’s dance a little,’ she grins, ‘then go to the clay for instructions. It speaks - you just have to learn to listen.’

This is no ordinary ‘sip and paint’ studio. Yes, you can bring wine. Yes, Jean can organise a tapas table, but here, what you’re really doing is something more elemental. Participants are invited to sit in front of a lump of stoneware or terracotta and wait… to feel what the clay wants to become. Make a flower-pressed tile, a Mexican-style candlestick, or a mug that wobbles beautifully because you made it.  For Jean, even the wheel feels like learning a new language - one that allows you to speak with your hands. ‘Finding your voice in clay,’ she says, ‘is like remembering a part of yourself.’

Dirt Studio is also becoming a space for art therapy and collaboration. There are classes for kids, where the immediacy of clay keeps little hands curious. Jean is also dreaming of a yoga and art gallery area behind the Dirt studio. ‘It would be a mixed space,’ Jean says, ‘a creative ecosystem.’ She envisions a group of friends laughing around the big table, music up, wine glasses clinking and creativity in high gear and she is also creating sessions just for men, to loosen up… to explore… and to tune in.

Perhaps the mosaic wall best captures what this place is about. Each visitor contributes a tile - no two alike. And side by side, they tell a story of community… of creative courage, of play, and of memory set in stone.  Already, the word is spreading and Jean is inviting established artists like Emma Thompson and others to use clay as a new kind of canvas. The studio is simple, but set up mindfully and the energy is unmistakable: Dirt is not just a ceramics studio. It is a space of softening, expression, and of becoming.

In the end, what Jean has created here is less about pottery and more about possibility. A reminder that even in forgotten corners, amongst crumbling bricks and broken tiles, beauty can take shape. And that sometimes, all it takes is a little dirt under your fingernails to find your way back to yourself.

Connect with Jean Dollery on 083 709 9020