What’s New at the Market Sept. 6 and Sept. 13

Corner of Sequim Avenue and Washington Street

Saturdays 9 a.m.-3 p.m.

What’s new at the market is the abundance of tomatoes and eggplant coming from SpringRain Farm, the abundance of carrots from Nash’s Farm and the bounty of flowers coming from Emily’s Flowers, plus the continual flow of honey from Elwha Apiary.

Come celebrate the harvest season fresh and local!I had the honor to interview with Michel McCarter on her birthday.

Not only that, she was celebrating 50 years since she began working with clay. Michel is the owner of Madrona Ridge Pottery and is a long-standing, wonderful member of the market as she started 17 years ago.

Michel came to Sequim from California, though not as quickly as was desired. Her husband’s family had three boys and when her in-laws retired, they dreamed to have their three sons live on the same property with them.

They retired to Sequim and bought 20 acres of land. Soon after the purchase, two of the brothers got to work on building their parents’ house with a contractor, meanwhile living in tents, trailers and a storage building.

The next house also was built by the two brothers and the contractor but when it came time to build the third house, they had learned well and just the two brothers put it up. The pressure was on for Noel, the third brother, Michel’s husband, to come and start on his home. At this time Michel was teaching art at Bakersfield Community College in California and they were happy there until she was transferred to a different college.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work out so well there. She was pregnant at the time and realized it was time for a change. In 1982, they left California with a 9-month-old baby and headed for Sequim.She explained that she had taken courses for two years preparing to be a nurse and realized her real love was working with clay. She went on to take every art class offered at her community college and then went to San Jose State University where she earned her Masters of Arts with a concentration in ceramics.

That is what put her on course to teach art at the college level. When Michel, Noel and her daughter Amber moved to Sequim, she searched far and wide to find a teaching job in the region and was unsuccessful.

“Here is a little back story,” she says. “Two of my students were Noel’s brother and his wife and that is how I met Noel.”

Now in Sequim, living among two fellow potters, they devised a plan to go into business. They built an enormous kiln that held about 150 pots in it and started making product.

As time went on her brother and sister-in-law continued in other professions and Michel stayed with her original love of clay. At that time she did tremendous amounts of hand-thrown mugs, bowls, casserole dishes, etc. The three of them had amassed booklets with listings of craft events around the state and would send in applications trying things out and finding what worked.

Now many years later she has transitioned to working with slabs of clay in which she creates impressions of the mountains, a variety of Asian letters and imagery, as well as lavender and other plants like bamboo.

Her work is both functional and decorative. She has a great selection of earth-toned pieces as well as her infamous purple. She tells me that she loves the slab work because she makes her design based on her mood and never makes the same thing twice.

“It is so much fun,” she said.

She did downsize her kiln many years ago. She says she ordered a kit, which turned out to be a very rough frame sent with a box of bricks.

Nonetheless they put it together and it has served her well. She does gas firing exclusively to create a particular finish and color that is distinctive.  Being one of our longest-standing members, I asked her how she has seen the market change over the years.

She says it has “grown a lot!” and she has seen lots of market managers come and go, which she says has been “mostly positive.”

For Michel, the market is a weekly social gathering event. She says she looks forward to it every week. She is a dog lover and every Saturday she has a chance to visit with lots of dogs, some of which come to see her every week.

“It is my weekly escape to come to the market,” says Michel.As for sales, “they go up and down, overall it averages out and is well worth it. You never know how the day will go, like today it’s cloudy and cool and I am having a great day.”

She says she likes the people watching and tries to guess when she spots someone headed her way if they are going to buy or not, turns out she isn’t always right.

She also has started a very popular line of earrings that are made of all sorts of scrap metal pieces, wooden beads, clay beads and interesting papers. She puts them together and makes these lovely earrings and necklaces.

In some of the galleries around the region where her work can be found, the jewelry has started to outsell the pottery. She tells me she loves making it.Come visit Michel in Centennial Place and take in the fantastic quality of work that she creates and bring your dog if you have one.

On Sept. 6, the Suzanne Arnold Booth will be hosted by the Peninsula Friends of Animals; they will be selling their fabulous potholders, all proceeds going to support the animals. The Gem and Mineral Association also will be present.

On Sept. 13, the Sequim Aquatic Recreation Center will be using the Community Booth to help us stay informed of all the plans that are brewing to keep our important and wonderful recreation center sustained.

The music will be a great mix of artists organized by Cort Armstrong on Sept. 6 and the Cats Meow Band will be back for more good times on Sept. 13. Live music is from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. every Saturday.

See you at the market.