Donna Bloye, Oto NI Pottery - North Down Coast Collection

The most incredible opportunity to arise from winning The Great Pottery Throw Down 2024 has been the chance to collaborate with Duchess China 1888 and to create an exclusive design for them. I selected these classic shapes from Duchess’ vast catalogue of Fine Bone China and using my signature, hand-painted blue and yellow colour scheme, created an Octopus design inspired by my life on the North Down Coast in Northern Ireland.

It has been a privilege to work with the skilled team at Duchess to combine my contemporary design with their classically shaped Fine Bone China pieces.  Seeing my idea go from conception to reality, using traditional manufacturing processes that have been in place at Duchess for over 130 years. As someone who is obsessed with both clay and heritage craft it really doesn’t get much better than this!

It is important to me that the pieces are UK made from start to finish, all under one roof at the Duchess factory in the heart of the potteries in Longton. It is also the perfect excuse to return to Stoke, for those spectacular sunsets and sunrises over the bottle kilns that I fell in love with during my time at Gladstone.

Collaborating with Duchess has been a dream come true, and I feel immensely proud to be a very small part of the legacy of this heritage company.

Does this make me an Honorary Stokie now?

Donna