We were lucky to catch up with Nia Sanders recently and have shared our conversation below.

Nia, appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I had my first experience working with clay sometime way back in middle school, but I really started to deep dive about 5 years ago. I stumbled on a community pottery studio randomly, Artshack in Brooklyn, NY, signed up for class a few months later (this was 2020, so the pottery wheels were set up outside!) and have been hooked ever since. I took classes pretty consistently for about 1-2 years, joined the membership at that studio to get unlimited access around that 2 year mark, and have since continued my membership at a different location and I like to take workshops when I have the time. I also have learned a lot from potters on Youtube and other social platforms, and the other artists that I’m in community with.

Making pottery is a highly technical process, so I don’t know that there’s much that I could have done to speed up my learning process. I think that making the transition from weekly classes to an unlimited membership around the time that I did was what allowed me to grow from a beginner to small business owner in 5 years because once I felt that I had enough skills to make pieces without instruction, I was able to practice as much as I had the time for which allowed me to accelerate my learning process.

It’s so hard to pick which skills are the most essential because there are too many to name! Honestly, patience is one of the most essential skills in this art form, or any for that matter. I have to continue developing my patience not only for the moments when I’m actively working on a piece, since I find that when I start to rush is typically when I start to mess things up, but also for all of the waiting in between, when I’m waiting for something to dry or for something to come out of the kiln or some other aspect of the process. As I mentioned, pottery making is incredibly technical, so even as I grow my skills in a way that allows me to do certain things more quickly, there is so much focus, care, and patience involved at each step to make sure that each piece is well executed.

As far as technical skills go though for working on the pottery wheel, being able to center the clay — which is the first step when you’re making anything on the wheel — and keeping it centered while you work is critical. You can work with a wobbly piece, but once you learn how to center and keep it centered then you can set yourself up well to make something that can last!

I’ve been fortunate along my journey that I haven’t faced many, if any, obstacles along the way. Pottery making is a time intensive craft, and can be incredibly expensive depending on if and where you’re able to access the resources, and I’m grateful to have had the time and money to put towards this pursuit. If anything, my main obstacles right now have to do with the business and administrative side of things rather than the craft itself, but that’s a whole other story.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m Nia Estelle, owner and founder of Estelle’s Atelier, a handmade ceramics business based in Brooklyn, NY. I first got into ceramics in 2020, when I found a local studio that set their pottery wheels along the sidewalk for “socially distanced class”, and have been hooked ever since. I currently sell my work online and in person at select in person markets and pop-ups. I have a regular stock available that I’m constantly refreshing, and I do take a small number of commissions throughout the year.

Through Estelle’s Atelier, my primary mission is to create and share pieces that can make every day life a little more beautiful. Whether it be a decorative vase as a centerpiece on your dinning room table, to a coffee mug that feels just right in your hands, I love how handmade homewares can bring joy and intentionality to each moment and any space and I’m so excited to share that joy with others.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Buy their work! Show up to local markets, shop at those local boutique stores in your town, share the artwork that you love online (and ALWAYS credit the artist if you’re not re-sharing something from them directly). And if you know any artists and/or creatives personally, show up for them. Tell them that you’re proud of them, support them in the ways that you can when the have their showcases whether it be helping them set up or boosting their promotions to your circle. Putting yourself out there can be so hard and daunting at any stage in the creative journey, so in your life would love to have you in their corners cheering them on.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I’ve had to unlearn the idea that there’s a certain way to be an “artist”. Earlier in my journey I felt self-conscious about the fact that I don’t have a fine art degree and that art making currently isn’t my full time role. The reality is, anyone living a creative life can claim the identity of an artist, and how you express that artistry is fully up to you. You don’t have to have gallery representation or need to be earning tens of thousands of dollars a year for your commissions to be an artist (or have tens of thousands of social media followers since that’s a more modern metric) — if you are driven by a desire to create and be a creative, whether you’re actively making artwork right now or not, you’re already an artist and you get to do what you want with that title from there.

I think some of the backstory of this way of thinking for me comes not only from general cultural and societal ideas about what makes an artist a “capital-A Artist”, but also from my days growing up as a dancer, where I learned that there were few pathways to be come a true professional “Dancer”. Similar to the idea of being an Artist, the Dancer had to have a certain kind of role, dance at a certain kind of company, and have a certain kind of pathway to claim the title. But what about people who like to take dance class for fun? What about those who make and perform their own work at small venues or in public spaces?

I do think that overall there are more ways to become a Dancer or an Artist or any other creative title than there were in the past, so I think we’re expanding beyond past ideas of what those titles meant and how you had to get there. I know that I’m not the only Artist who is undoing this way of thinking for themselves, so I’m glad that overall we’re moving in a more encompassing and inclusive direction.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.estellesatelier.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/estelles.atelier
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@estelles.atelier
• Other: https://tiktok.com/@estelles.atelier

Image Credits

Madeline Ettinger, Nia E. Sanders