A Potter’s Kitchen

It’s a fair assumption that a potter’s kitchen will be filled with their own cups and plates. But South-African born, east London-based ceramicist Skye Corewijn is an avid collector of other people’s creations. “I’m a magpie for pots. I do have a few of my own pieces at home, but nothing matches. My tableware is made by friends or people I admire or comes from all over the world. I was recently in Mexico visiting small pottery towns near Oaxaca and I bought so many pots back.”

Happily, though, when we meet for coffee on a rare, sunny February morning in the studio she shares with fellow ceramicist Andrea Roman, Skye sips from a stoneware mug fired in a wood-kiln during a week in Devon last year. “The aesthetic is different to an electric kiln because there’s only so much you can control. The wood becomes ash and as the draw from the chimney pulls heat through the kiln, ash flies with it, sticks to the pot and melts,” she explains.

Meanwhile, I drink from a stoneware mug decorated with a looping wave-like pattern – part of a new series of work she has made especially for the TOAST Spring Summer 2026 collection, A Shared Table (there is also a pasta plate and vase). “It’s the kind of doodle I used to do when I was younger, all over the telephone book, while using the landline. I love that it’s one movement of the brush: freehand, with red iron oxide, and there’s no second chances.”

Over the last decade or so, Skye’s signature style – mostly wheel-thrown stoneware, simple in form, with a focus on shape and texture – has made her one of the go-to potters for top chefs on the London restaurant scene (and beyond) looking to present their food on handmade crockery. “It’s so common now but when I made my first plates, chefs were only just beginning to really think about what they were serving food on and be more mindful about the dining experience as a whole,” she recalls.

Prior to that, pottery was a hobby for Skye who took her first course with ceramicist Stuart Carey as an antidote to her desk-bound day job in music events and part-time front of house shifts at Upstairs at the Ten Bells (run by the Young Turks chef collective). She then spent a couple of years selling her pots at Druid Street market in Bermondsey and as a studio assistant with Jess Jos, before chef Giorgio Ravelli kickstarted her career with a commission.

Word soon spread and these days, around 75 percent of her work is for restaurants (most recently rice bowls for Impala, a new Soho space from the Super 8 group, which is also behind Brat and Mountain). The rest of her time is split between bespoke requests and other clients. On my visit, a stack of tiles made for an architect’s house in Spain sits in one corner while on the central table, snack bowls for a soon-to-open hotel in the Scottish Highlands wait for their first firing.

Then there’s making pieces for her own shop, Klei, on Hackney Road. “Klei is a labour of love and an outlet for my pot buying habit,” jokes Skye of the space, which also sells work by other UK makers and hosts rotating monthly guest artists. “The UK has such an ingrained appreciation of studio pottery, and I've always hoped Klei exists for both pottery enthusiasts and those picking up their first handmade mug.”

When at the studio, she mostly listens to audiobooks “especially if it’s a big production throwing day” while her time at home is more for planning and play. “In recent years I’ve started exploring more with painting, even doing little watercolours for fun. I think what’s great about pottery is that you can keep evolving.” Cooking though, is mostly down to her partner, Mitshel Ibrahim (the chef behind Ombra and Forno) who in winter, whips up homely one-pot suppers and stews. “Bernard Leach championed the idea of beauty in everyday things and for me, that’s cooking and sharing food served on useful functional ware, at a table with friends and family. Sometimes I pinch myself to think that my plates are part of people’s daily lives and it brings them joy.”