Cat Bowl 2020!

A pottery fundraiser to help rescue cats!

A brief history:

For a while now potteries have been participating in a global grassroots movement called Empty Bowls to help end hunger in their communities. Periodically one organizing pottery will reach out to the other local potters for bowl donations (we always say yes when we can), and host a fundraising event. The proceeds go to a local partner food charity.

We already have a great organizer in our community (I will make sure to pass along that information the next time they are organizing an Empty Bowls our area), so I leave that organizing in their more than capable hands.

Here at ESP we have developed a small, albeit important-to-us, weakness for rescue kitties. In the Fall of 2019, I had the idea to adapt the Empty Bowls format for a smaller fundraiser to help rescue local cats.

The first event in this project was a volunteer night of throwing bowls by our studio members. It was a really fun night and we still talk about it: We brought spouses and taught them how to wedge clay, we threw a ton of bowls, and then we drank a lot of wine.

The next step of the project was for me to finish trimming and glazing the bowls and slipping them into upcoming firings. I also gave myself the challenge of matching the total amount of bowls thrown that night with my own bowls.

The third step was going to be a big fundraiser party where we sold the bowls with a community potluck. But… Covid shutdown happened. I toyed with the idea of doing a virtual event, but frankly we were all getting a little Zoom’d out, and I just didn’t see it working the way we hoped. As time went on and we navigated masks and limited events, I decided to put Cat Bowl on the back burner.

The Next Step:

Fast forwarding three years: I’ve continued to collect, make, and store more bowls for Cat Bowl, whenever it might happen. We’re finally reaching a point where life is getting back to pre-pandemic normal, and I feel comfortable hosting big social events again.

What I need now… is a cat rescue partner! I will be reaching out on social media for community suggestions.

More to come!!