Featured Artist: Sallyanne Meekins Ceramics

Sally tells of her love affair with miniatures & her inspiration for new designs.

My first encounter with miniatures was when I visited Kensington Dollshouse Festival with a keen collector friend in 2001, at the time I was making full size pieces. The whole miniature experience became addictive and sparked an idea…25 years later I’m still working in small scale having refined my making method several times over. 

I mainly throw my pieces on a wheel now, but when I first started I made my own plaster moulds and used the slip cast technique. There have been a lot of trial and errors along the way. I learned to throw when I was studying for my BA hons degree in Industrial & Product design, where I specialized in Ceramics and glass. It was during Covid that I put my throwing skills back into practice, after acquiring a mini wheel and a good set of metal throwing tools. It took some practice throwing on such a small scale, I use an earthenware based throwing clay and the finished piece can take up to 3 firings in my Nabertherm kiln. 

I love everything fun & quirky! A lot of my ideas come from sketching out ideas in my head and remembering my favourite fairytales from my childhood. During my studies at college I was inspired by the works of the Bauhaus movement, especially architecture by Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier as well as paintings by Paul Klee. I have a passion for mid-century ceramics & art deco, the designs of midwinter & Clarice Cliff have inspired my mini work. It was during my regular visits to the V&A where I came across the large delft tulip vases which I also love to make.

When I was at college I entered the Royal society of arts design bursary, it was a national competition for art & design students. My entry was based on the 17th century slipware chargers produced by Thomas Toft, I updated the patterns and used them to create a modern day version that could be used on Wedgewood china for the Bridal giftware market . So today I’m still getting great pleasure in recreating these 17th century chargers by Thomas Toft for my own mini collection !

Creating pieces in such a tiny scale is such a joy, I never had the same passion creating things in full size, also the materials go a lot further! I love coming up with new ideas, and throwing that piece for the first time gives me such a buzz (when it turns out right). 

I have a lot of pleasure making and thinking up new ideas for my cabbage & veggie range, I use my own moulds to hand press the leaves and the rest is thrown on the wheel, but the work I’m most proud of was a recent custom order filling a Masters Miniatures 1940’s cabinet with wheel thrown kitchen storage jars incorporating a simple streamlined look from that period. 

I have currently been working on a Strawberry themed range of 1:12 ceramics. It started with a request from a customer asking for a ‘strawberry’ themed tea-set. Of course my imagination started with all sorts of possibilities, first I had to find a dresser to display the range and made matching strawberry drawer knobs. I had to figure out a way of how I was going to create the surface texture of strawberries with all those seeds! I ended up having to make my own tool for the job, all are wheel thrown with some press moulded leaf decoration. 

The range has grown including jugs, casserole pots, teapots, mugs, plates and a complete tea-set. It’s my feature range, NEW for this Showcase and can be found listed on my Etsy shop .

See more of Sally’s work HERE