ROYCE McGLASHEN

BRADEN FASTIER/ STUFF //

Potter Royce McGlashen was born on a farm in the Richmond Hills. He became an apprentice potter as a teenager and has been obsessed with the craft ever since. His pottery includes both hand-built and machine-made pieces inspired by the sea. He shares his bright, airy home with his wife, Trudi.

ROYCE: We’ve been in this house for 18 years. I was born in Richmond, and my wife was born in Nelson. But you have to go around the world about three or four times before you meet each other in a pub, down the road – actually it was at an exhibition.

I first bought an old cob house over the road from the pottery. It was built in 1856, and I thought it’d be a great project to restore that building. We lived there for 29 years. We brought up our children there.

Then our kids left home, and we wanted a bigger property – we both enjoy gardening and space. Then we found this place. You’re looking to the north, and you’re always bathed in early morning sun, and it stays sunny, right till the sun goes down. It’s a typical Nelson position.

We have 1¼ acres. We’re very lucky there, we get a night wind, a katabatic wind, which comes down, so we can grow semi-tropical plants. It’s all alluvial, terraced land. We can grow passionfruit and avocados and lots of fruit trees. Down on the flat, it was big enough to put in a croquet lawn. Trudi, my wife, has always been a keen croquet player.

I do have a pretty area, which is my rose garden. My grandfather always grew roses, so I thought, “here’s the time of my life I can do that”. It’s quite a big area, about half the size of a tennis court. We’re very lucky, here in Nelson we have Tasman Roses, great rose developers. They developed a rose for the 125th anniversary of Nelson College for Girls. We have some of those, and they’re just stunning roses.

I’ve done pottery all my life; my father had a small pottery on the farm. I was 16, not blessed with great academic abilities, and Waimea Pottery had just started in Richmond. I had the opportunity of taking a five-year apprenticeship. You were taught how to throw and turn, glaze and fire, all those sorts of things, for five years.

I can throw pots quickly and effectively, and I’ve been doing that for 56 years. I think it’s more fulfilling than painting pictures, which I also do a lot.

Ceramics – after 56 years, you’d think I’d have burnt myself out on that, but no. There’s always something that comes up with texture, or colour, or effect to keep me interested.

As well as my handmade pots, I like to make a lot of domestic ware that people can use, to make a lovely salad in, things like that. That’s really important.

Since cheap imports came into the country, in about the 1980s, when they took all the restrictions off imports, I thought, “well, how am I going to survive here? I can’t hand make a bowl for $5. I can’t employ people to do that.” So we have a theme of shells – we find them on the beach – and we have a machine to make our shell designs, so you can make them quite efficiently and effectively. That’s our main point of difference to the imported stuff coming in: You’re supporting a Kiwi business.