Lacquer-turned bowl
the object
Shallow and wide, turned from a single piece with the grain running across the base. Light enough to lift with two fingers at the rim.
The bands are dragged, not painted. A bamboo splinter is drawn across the soft lac while the bowl is still turning, so each colour reaches into the one beside it a different distance every time round.
Good for fruit, bread, keys and post. Wipe it; do not soak it. Standing water will lift the lac at the rim.
- Dimensions
- 240 mm across, 92 mm deep.
- Material
- Local hardwood, natural lac
- Finish
- Lac, burnished on the lathe. Food-safe for dry contents; not for liquids and not for the dishwasher.
- Variation
- The combing is done freehand while the lac is soft, so every band drags differently.
- Lead time
- Three weeks.
the tradition
Kutch lacquer turning
Nirona
One pass, at speed, with no way to correct it.
Kutch lacquer work uses the same principle as Channapatna and arrives somewhere quite different. Colour is applied as a stick of lac against the spinning wood, but here a second step follows: while the lac is still soft, a splinter of bamboo is drawn across it, dragging one colour into the next.
That drag is why the bands are feathered rather than clean. It is done in one pass, at speed, with no way to correct it, which is the whole reason the technique is worth anything.
the maker
Dinesh
Turner, 15 years, Nirona.
He runs the lathe slower than most, which lets the colours bleed further into one another.
This object is not yet for sale.
Join the list and we will write when the first collection opens. Once, and about that.
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