02 — Ceramics & Client Work · Project 262
01 — Brief
Greene King were opening a new beer garden to expand their pub and grill. The addition created an immediate operational challenge: tables now existed both inside and outside the venue, across two distinct zones with layouts that shifted regularly — different every weekend, different for private events, different across seasons.
Waiters couldn't reliably identify tables. The layout changed. The numbering didn't.
Existing systems — printed cards, chalkboard panels, fixed signs — assumed a static arrangement. Every reconfiguration broke them. The commission was to design a table number solution that could flex with the space, work indoors and outdoors, and hold up through regular use.
02 — Solution
The answer was material rather than mechanical. Each piece is a hand-thrown ceramic vessel — compact, low-centred, stable on uneven garden surfaces and resistant to being knocked. The form reads as intentional on a table. It belongs there.
The exterior surface is coated in blackboard paint, applied post-bisque, turning every piece into a rewritable surface. Numbers are written in chalk and wiped clean whenever the layout changes. No reprinting. No replacing. Any configuration of tables — inside or outside — can be numbered in under a minute.
The blackboard surface doesn't just solve the problem — it absorbs it entirely.
A fired ceramic vessel also does something a printed card or plastic holder can't: it adds to the atmosphere of the space. The weight, texture, and permanence of the material signal care without demanding attention.
03 — Making
Each vessel thrown on the wheel using stoneware clay. The form is compact and weighted low — stable on uneven garden paving, unlikely to be knocked. Wall thickness kept consistent across the run.
Fired to bisque temperature. The exterior is left unglazed — the slight tooth of the bisque surface is essential for the blackboard paint to bond properly and survive repeated wiping without flaking.
Blackboard paint applied to the exterior body in controlled coats, masked to keep the rim and interior clean. Cured and conditioned with chalk before delivery — ready to write on from day one, with no ghosting.
40 units produced across multiple sessions to maintain consistency across the batch. Each piece handled individually for finishing. Delivered ready for immediate use across both the indoor and beer garden zones.
40
Units Produced
∞
Rewritable Configurations
2×
Venue Zones Covered