Today we’d like to introduce you to Carla Tome.
Carla, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I studied painting and ceramics at SFAI, and after graduating, I worked part-time jobs in the restaurant industry while making my art. In 2008 I quit my restaurant job to pursue making art full time. I was working both in paint and in clay.
A year or so later, I got a part-time job teaching a drawing class and a ceramics class at Plaza de La Raza. A few years after this I accidentally landed a job at East Los Angeles City College working as the instructional assistant/Lab tech for the ceramic part of the art department.
It was when I was working there in 2013 that I started Tome Ceramics. It was when a friend of mine offered to share a table with her at a small pop up called Eastside Handmade, that the whole small craft market was revealed to me. I immediately sold a good amount of work and quickly started to do other small popups.
I really loved my job at the college, but I outgrew it and also wanted to focus full time on making my own work. So I left ELAC in June of 2015 at the end of the spring semester and started to pursue Tome Ceramics full time.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
No, it has not always been a smooth road. Like anything you do it has its ups and downs. Especially when I first left ELAC. I left a job with security and benefits to pursue something I loved but didn’t have a regular paycheck.
The money I had saved for hopefully buying a house, I put into setting up my studio. I’ve had to learn how to balance my time between making my work, and learning how to do the business and marketing. Learning how to say no was also a hard thing to learn.
You always want to say yes to everything because you think you have to, or you think you’ll be missing an opportunity. But if you say yes to everything you get burned out fast, and you realize not every opportunity is the right one for you (something you will still learn even when you think it is a surefire deal.)
This has probably been the hardest lesson for me, weighing the where and when to put myself. I also just want to make my work and be in the studio all the time, that’s the artist side of me. But you can’t always do that. You need to get supplies, repair studio equipment, update websites, post to social media, follow up on orders, ship orders.
You have to get out there and see other people’s work, go see shops that may carry your work and somewhere in there you have to have some quality time with friends, family and “me time.”Although it has been slow going, it has been steady going.
I’m fortunate enough that every year my business grows a little bit more and more every year, the growing public response, the new contacts, and the new accounts; that’s what keeps me going.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Tome Ceramics story. Tell us more about the business.
My business is a small hand made ceramic company. I specialize in functional ceramics. I make and design all of the work. I make mostly one of a kind functional work. While I do production work, most of what I do is small batches, and everything is handmade.
As of the end of 2017, I hired my first studio assistant to help me with studio maintenance and to cast some of the pieces I have designed and made from molds. I’m mostly known for my hand-carved pieces, my glaze choices, the patterns that I carve and the simplistic and bold nature of my shapes.
I’m proud of the work I make and the quality of it. I’m proud of the design. I’m proud to making things by hand in the 21st century in Los Angeles carrying on the rich craft history of not only California but of America and the whole ceramic culture.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
Luck has played somewhat of a role with me. I’d be foolish to say I wasn’t lucky that I get to do what I love, and I am very lucky to have the support of my husband, family, and friends who believe in me. It hasn’t just been luck; it’s hard work and dedication.
I go to work in my studio Monday through Friday and when I have to, on the weekends. If I’m not in the studio, I’m at home doing office work for the studio. Ceramics take a lot of work and time, it is, for the most part, a long drawn out process that I do love. There are many steps to creating a piece.
First, you have to make your piece, let it dry, bisque fire it, which can take anywhere from 12-17 hours. Then unload the kiln, glaze each piece and then reload it in the kiln for the second firing. This, this is something all ceramic artists can attest to; no matter how long you’ve worked in clay, or how good you are, the clay will always show you that you don’t know everything.
Pieces can break or crack, glazes can run, work can get stuck together, it’s fire water and earth all doing what it does when we’re not looking. I guess I have to say, I’m luckiest most when it all comes together, and my favorite pieces aren’t ruined!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.tomeceramics.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: @tomeceramics
Image Credit:
Eric William Pierson
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