Passion and patience is the key to the unique craft of master Tipperary potter

In the workshop adorned with terracotta splashed walls and scrawls of formulae only a true master could decipher, the unique art of Rossa Pottery emerges from the hands of potter Alan Walsh.

Rossa was established by his father Ned Walsh and is celebrating sixty years in business this year. The art of producing pottery, characterised by its distinctive glaze, is second nature to Alan, who shared his father’s love of creating the completely handmade pieces that are now sold all over the world.
“I always say if you put me in the oven at this stage now and cook me I wouldn’t burn I’d come out ceramic,” said Alan.
Alan’s earliest memory is as a two-year-old crawling on the workshop floor as his father Ned worked on the throwing wheel. He remembers the plunger machine working in the background as Ned gave him a piece of clay to occupy himself with. Alan decided to make a model of his dog Bunker that became his first foray into pottery.

“My Dad fired it and that’s now below at my own house. That’s my first memory of the workshop, at two years of age and I still remember making it,” he said.

The unique nature of his father’s trade never struck Alan as something special until he saw the fascination his peers had for it. One year during his birthday party, his friends descended into the workshop and they stood around Ned, in awe of him working at the wheel. “He said, ‘Right, who wants to have a go at this?’” remembered Alan.

UNIQUE NATURE
Alan watched in amazement as all the eager hands shot up. At that moment, it dawned on him the unique nature of his father’s trade.
“It was the first time I could see there’s magic in this,” said Alan.
Ned wasn’t always a potter. To forge a career, he migrated to London in the 50s. While he worked in a host of unusual jobs, such as in a chocolate factory, Mars, the journey of Rossa truly began when Ned was working in cinema’s Pinewood Studios as a wages clerk.

When everyone in the office would leave the building during lunch breaks, Ned preferred to stay and watch the magic of filmmaking take place. A blockbuster he witnessed being produced was ‘A Night to Remember,’ one of the first cinematic retellings of Titanic.
To convey the immense ship being infamously submerged in the Atlantic, an extensive reconstruction took place by craftspeople who recreated the scene by using a model and a tub of water.

The tricks of the trade caught Ned’s artistic eye for craft. He then noted another instance of model making when the studio was assembling an elaborate Egyptian scene. A group of artists came on set to create tiny model pyramids that reconstructed the iconic landmarks. Ned noted their realism was astounding.
Determined to make it in this highly skilled profession, he took advantage of the wide variety of options available in London and studied pottery in the Central College of Art. Ned also travelled around England to learn from masters whose techniques dated back to the Industrial Revolution, all while being completely handmade.

ROSSA FORMULA
While studying glass, glazes and colour with a chemist in pottery, Ned invented a type of glaze completely unique. In that fateful moment the distinctive Rossa formula was born. To this day, the process is sworn to secrecy and keeping such an oath is ingrained in Alan’s consciousness.
Keeping his newfound discovery to himself, Ned returned to Cashel in 1962 and set up shop in a stable yard on the back of a pub on Cashel’s Main Street, on a site rented from businesswoman Mai Clifford. The pair struck up a deal that included the terms Ned could work in the yard, and in return May would sell the pottery and proudly display it on her window.
After a few years, Ned moved the pottery studio to the outskirts of Cashel. Alan and his wife Sarah would return to Main Street once again and the business now operates from both locations, as well as selling from their new online shop.
Alan began to get involved in the business as a child, following the premature death of his mother. Ned found it difficult to keep the business going due to this profound loss, and Alan rallied behind him to keep the magic of Rossa alive. Alan began to help sell the pottery and remembers pitching the work to businesses as a youngster.
“I looked really young and I used to go into the shops with a suitcase myself and try and sell the pottery, and that was back in the 80s when it was tough going,” said Alan.

When he left secondary school, Alan decided to study ceramics. He added to his wealth of experience by training with the Craft Council of Ireland and working for masters in various apprenticeships.
Now a master production thrower himself, the technique takes an average of ten years to perfect. The skill allows each product to be uniform in shape and size all while being completely handmade, without moulds or machines. After studying in Ireland and Belgium, Alan returned to the family business brimming with ideas. He sought to introduce new colours, styles and modern ideas such as making the pottery dishwasher safe and waterproof. At this stage, Ned was 35 years in the game. The initial teething process of having a new master with a new set of ideas was not without conflict.
“We had war over it. When we came up with the new colours, I wanted bright blues and all these new ideas and he kept going back to the old colours, his stuff was going dark again,” said Alan.

BLANK SLATE
One weekend when Ned was away in Sligo to visit family, Alan went into the studio and decided to take matters into his own hands in order to create a necessary blank slate.
“Every piece of pottery that I had in his workshop, every piece… I broke it up. I broke it up and buried it,” he said.
Upon Ned’s return, Alan had to disappear for the weekend for fear of the reaction. However, the radical approach worked and the business began to soar.

Another key player in the success of Rossa is Alan’s wife Sarah, a fellow potter. The pair met at the early stages of their careers when studying in Thomastown, Kilkenny. When asked to help in the Rossa Pottery, Sarah was bestowed the ultimate honour of being let in on the top secret glazing technique.
The sheer passion for their craft kept the couple going, despite difficult hours and the business requiring constant devotion. For twenty years, Alan would follow the gruelling routine of early starts at three in the morning, where he would work in the studio until half seven. After trying to rest for an hour, the working day would begin again until nine or ten at night. Alan remembers that when working on the run up to Christmas, his hands would bleed from the intense workload.
To hone in on developing new ideas, the pair recently decided to take a small break from selling to other shops, while continuing to run the showroom and Rossa Pottery shop alongside a website developed during the pandemic.

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PATIENCE
Pottery requires patience, and even for a master potter like Alan there is still a high margin of error. Once the doors of the kiln open, you can never be too sure what to expect.
“Every time you open the doors, you open a brand new oven,” said Alan.
One tedious step in the process is biscuit firing, a process that sees the temperature in the kiln reach one thousand degrees centigrade. During this process the clay turns to rock. Sometimes the contractions of the clay can go wrong and split, causing the pot to crumble when removed from the kiln.
The glaze firing also requires high temperatures, with a very complicated procedure in place to create the trademark Rossa design. Sometimes the glazes drip too much. The only way they can be removed from the shelf is with a hammer. This heart-breaking process is uncompromising, and despite the hours of devotion the piece can still fall at the final hurdle.
Despite the often difficult and laborious nature of pottery, Alan maintains an infectious enthusiasm for the craft.
“I am extremely passionate about it and I’m protective of the handmade because there’s not enough emphasis on handmade anymore. I always say that when people put their hand into their pocket and take out their money and pay you for something you made with your own hands - that’s a great thing,” said Alan.
“I am very grateful for everyone who buys my pottery and throughout the years the people of Cashel have been very good to us,” said Alan.

MAGIC IN THE PROCESS
Alan maintains there is magic in the process. Pottery requires taking a piece of rotten rock that is a blight to farmers as it repels water and creates boggy land and transforms this into a piece of functional art.
“When I was learning to throw, I spent hours and hours and hours practising and working with experts and picking their brains.

I thought it would come naturally, but it didn’t. To see those guys throw was absolutely magical. I didn’t realise I was as good as them until Sarah had to video me one day on her phone, because when I’m throwing, I don’t see it, and when I could see it on camera, I was like ‘oh wow, that guy can throw!” said Alan.
Many returning customers collect the pottery or use it to mark milestone events. People compare the glaze to resembling a volcanic eruption as it has the enigmatic quality of vibrant molten rock, while others can see butterflies or flowers in the intricate patterns created by the glaze.

MODERN APPEARANCE
A compliment Alan holds to the highest regard occurred when one shopkeeper said the pieces sold well due to their modern appearance.
“I thought you know what? Fair play to my father, because those designs are seventy years old. It’s still modern, because that’s good design. And good design should never age,” said Alan.
Ned passed away in 2012, however his memory is kept alive as Rossa Pottery continues to thrive. The four walls of the studio hold countless happy memories of the pair working together, united by their shared dedication to the craft.
“He was my tutor and he was my best mate,” said Alan. “He did say to me that the last twenty years of his life when I took over were probably the nicest twenty years, because I didn’t have to worry about anything. People used to say to him: ‘Ned, why don’t you retire?’ And he’d say, ‘Look it, when people retire, they take up pottery,” said Alan.

Two books, Artisans of Clonmel and Artisans of Cashel, were published before Christmas.
They were launched as part of Clonmel Applefest and the Cashel Arts Festival.
They both carry the stories of craftspeople in the community.
Over the coming months The Nationalist will carry stories from both books.
The story about Alan Walsh, a potter, is written by Aislinn Kelly.
AISLINN KELLY
Aislinn Kelly is a journalist and fourth year Journalism and Digital Communications student at the University of Limerick.
She has worked as a staff journalist with Tipperary’s The Nationalist and as a freelance writer. Covering everything from agriculture to the arts, her work is defined by a love of storytelling.