About Lee Wolfe

I have been a studio potter for 40 years. My ceramic work emerges from the organic beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains where I live in Asheville, North Carolina. The voluptuous forms and the woodland creatures in my pottery are totemic; intended to bring into your home the wild inexplicable magic of awakening to a bird's lyrics, eating from the garden and falling asleep under a moonlit blanket. 

I was born with a strong sense of style and personal taste, and I do not know where that came from. In my earliest memory, I look at my mother’s French Provincial furniture, sure that it is unacceptable, and try to inform her that we need to go with black and white modern. I was a 3 year old stylist with no clients. Later, as an art major, I did not like the propulsion to produce work solely for exhibition. It seemed disconnected from everyday life. I thought more about why pyrex dishes had hideous decals, and how much more satisfying it would be to serve food as an artistic presentation, with carefully curated and unique tableware.

More About me

After college I worked for several ceramic production studios. I respected the functional standards of production studios but felt that the work was joylessly driven by market demand, by “what people will buy.” Next I started my own studio, intent on making unique work that is innovatively challenging and fun. To my great relief, people have been willing to buy something fresh, unusual, exploratory, I found an audience who wants precisely that.

I work in stoneware clay fired in oxidation using glazes formulated for safe and enduring functional use. I push the clay to the edge of collapse, with ultra-thin walls, narrow bases demanding perfect balance, and altered rims. My aesthetic is minimalist, organic and rustic, yet achieved with advanced skills and highly focused attention. After all these years, it is still my greatest joy to enter my studio with a head full of new ideas.

My work was previously available in regional galleries of distinction such as Grovewood Gallery and Gallery of the Mountains (Asheville), Seven Sisters Gallery (Black Mountain, NC) and It's By Nature (Sylva, NC), although I now sell exclusively online. I enjoy conducting business while working in my pajamas. I am happy to be featured on style blogs including Apartment Therapy, Decor8, Babble, and the Etsy Blog.

My Philosophy

I am committed to making pottery that is durable, and designed for lifetimes of function and pleasure.  It is my intention that my pottery becomes a treasured part of your daily life, and an heirloom that is passed with wonderful memories through generations.

As I age I think about what builds connections, what draws people closer together, and how pottery fits into our lives in a meaningful way. Some of my best conversations have been at our dining table or picnic table, so I have focused a great deal of my design obsessions around dinnerware, serving bowls, and interesting casseroles. These pieces allow a table to be an artistic composition, a collage, which is infinitely more fun than setting those matchy-matchy commercial sets in their proper places. I also look back on the gifts I've given and received over the years. What stands out even decades later are the ones that had a personal and symbolic meaning at the time it was given. I think of what we really want to give those we cherish- wisdom, hope, harmonious relationships, success, safety, and I design pieces with those totemic powers: owls, birds in flight, vases with ying/yang shapes, poppies, and nests.