local faces
december 2021
Breaking the mould ― As told to Cara Cummings
Ceramic artist Aliya Rashid is the founder and owner of Clay Kiln Craft, a training and membership pottery studio in Crystal Palace. She shares the incredible story of how pottery changed her life - and how she built one of south London’s most thriving creative communities, single handed...
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first did pottery at college in Middlesbrough, which is where I grew up. I absolutely fell in love with it, and thought: this is what I want to do. But my father, like any good Asian father, was having none of it. “No child of mine is going to make pots for a living!” So I ended up doing a graphic design degree. I did the things you’re ‘supposed’ to do - got a job, got married, bought a house – and pushed pottery to the back of my mind, because I knew that if I went back to it, I couldn’t not do it. Then life happened; divorce, moving... I got offered a very good job as deputy art director on a national newspaper. That’s when I stopped and thought: I can’t do this. I immediately signed up to a pottery evening class in Norwood. I can still remember that class - I walked in, said hello, and just started making. I was like a woman possessed! I’m actually a very ‘graphic design’ person everything is rigid and lines up, all in its proper place. Normally my herbs and spices are in alphabetical order. Suddenly touching this material which couldn’t be precise was so liberating. I could zone out, and be out of my head just creating something. That’s what I love about pottery. It’s used in therapy for a reason - it allows you to express yourself without thinking you’re going deep, whilst you actually are.
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