Saggar Firing Technique for Pottery

It's always fun to try new things and I had an opportunity to try making saggar pottery in a workshop held by Musette Young last week. Who would have known you could get such interesting and varied results from a little ferric chloride,  Miracle Grow (yes, the stuff you put on plants), steel wool and a few other household ingredients. Here are the pieces we produced at the workshop, mine is the little pot farthest left:

 

There is always some element of mystery when applying the colorants and thinking about how they will turn out after the firing process is complete. -To me, that is always the fun part.  I'm pretty sure, the deep oranges seen below started with ferric chloride:

 

 

I don't think you can ever be 100% certain how a piece will turn out exactly.  Miracle Grow produces some of the green tints you see  in these two pictures below:

 

 

 

I had never heard of saggar before and am glad for the chance to try it out.

 

 

The term saggar actually refers to the container that is used to protect the pot when firing. We used two sheets of aluminum foil wrapped around the ceramic pieces for containers.

 

It was a fun project, give it a try if you ever get the chance.