Pine Mills Pottery studio and gallery

Welcome to the Pine Mills Pottery web site.  We appreciate your interest in our fine handmade pottery and hope you enjoy learning about our studio and work.  Our studio and gallery are located in the beautiful rolling woodlands of Northeast Texas about 100 miles east of Dallas and 30 miles north of Tyler.  Visitors are welcome at the pottery showroom where a large selection of our thoughtfully designed pottery is available for purchased.  The pottery is usually open seven days a week from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m., but if you are making a special trip please phone ahead

903-857-2271 to make sure the studio is open, as we are occasionally closed.  Directions to the pottery can be found here: DIRECTIONS.  There are many other things of interest to do locally. Check out our list of special places in our area to eat and visit here: THINGS TO DO LOCALLY. For accomodations in the area click here: AREA ACCOMMODATIONS.

This web site will give you a sampling of the exceptional ceramics made in our studio.  Visiting our showroom you will find a large selection of individual works of interest to collectors of fine contemporary ceramics, as well as everyday dinnerware and serving pieces.  All pieces are totally handmade from stoneware clay that we blend ourselves using nine separate ingredients, including four different clays from various mines across the southern United States.  Processes we use for creating our ceramic art works have been developed by us over more than thirty years, first as apprentices and then at our own studio established in 1979. We made the decission many years ago to make each individual piece ourselves and not deligate the making process to employees. This makes it possible for us to make each piece of exceptionally high quality. We use no commericial process such as molds, slip casting, jiggering, ram pressing, commercial glazes or commercially prepared claybodies.  

Pine Mills Pottery was established in 1979 after returning from Europe where we apprenticed with potters in England, France and Greece, including eighteen months at Lowerdown Pottery in Devon with David Leach and a shorter period of time with his brother Michael Leach at Yelland Pottery.  Work created at Pine Mills Pottery is primarily wood-fired stoneware, both thrown and constructed from slabs.  Work is produced in multiples, focusing on form, color and a high degree of quality.  Most work is fired in a 128 cubic foot Bourry box wood-fired kiln to cone 12 several times a year.  The kiln was built in 1983 and has been fired over 100 times.  In addition to our wood-fired kiln, we built a smaller 50 cubic foot gas-fired car kiln in 1987, in which bisque and glaze firing is done.  We work independently of each other and rarely collaborate on pieces, though we share the same studio, clays, glazes and kilns. We hope you enjoy exploring our web site and are able to come to the studio and gallery for a visit. Please get in touch with us if you would like to make a purchase or have questions.

Gary C. Hatcher and Daphne Roehr Hatcher

Click Here For A Blast From The Past

Many things change and some stay the same. Bob St. John wrote Artists Shape Life of Beauty in Rural Setting for The Dallas Morning News in 1994. Our commitment to making the "best pottery in the world" has not changed and our commitment to making every piece with our own hands has not changed. Our work is still "Handmade by Human Beings". Click on the link below to find the article from 1994 that still gives a pretty good overview of our history and philosophy. I think you will enjoy the read.

Artists Shape Life of Beauty in Rural Setting by Bob St. John
Dallas Morning News, Saturday, April 23rd 1994