Breva Creative’s makerspace allows you to explore every facet of your creative side.
SAN ANTONIO, Texas — I have always envied creative people. Those who can draw, or paint or sculpt just amaze me. Whenever the creative genes were handed out in my family…I must have been spending the night somewhere else. I have no artistic ability…or at least I thought.
“The first time someone makes something out of clay, it never turns out as they thought” says Breva Creative owner Brad Schaefer. Schaefer and his wife Eva opened their “Makerspace’ about 4 months ago and it has been growing ever since.
Schaefer says “We have a full wood shop, ceramics studio, print making studio, digital fabrication lab with 3-D printing, laser cutting, stained glass..uh textiles. You name it we probably have it.” No matter what your medium, Breva Creative will help you explore it.
When I found out I could try my hand at a clay spinning wheel, I was excited. I have seen people do it before and always wanted to try…but there is much more to it than i anticipated. First you choose how big of a piece of clay with which you want to work, then slam it down on a hard surface to work out any air bubbles.
Next, it needs to be kneeded, like bread dough! Once you have worked it, you form it into whatever basic shape with which you want to begin. I started with a two inch wide, 3 inch tall cylinder. My goal was to make a basic cup.
Centering it on the wheel takes a fairly accurate eye, but more importantly the proper speed on the wheel and pressure on each side of the clay, to move the blob as close to center as possible. Once there…the sky’s the limit! My creative ceiling is a little lower than most…I went for a basic cup.
The more the wheel spun, the more the cup changed…I had this grandiose idea of how cool the cup would be. In the end, I had a small dish about 4″ across and and inch and a half high. Regardless, it was perfect…or as close as an artistically challenged person could get.
After letting it dry a couple of days, we put it in the kiln to bake. A day later we opened the kiln and my little dish survived the heat. Now…glazing. I chose a two tone option with the inside glaze bubbling up to flow over the top and down the side. Once finished it was back into the kiln, to bake at 2200 degrees…and cool
When we opened the kiln the next day, I was wonderfully surprised how my sorry little dish has transformed. The glazing had done exactly as I had wanted it to do and there was this beautiful, multi colored, small dish waiting to be used. Watch the story, you will love this place! If you’d like to check out Breva Creative, click on this link: https://www.brevacreative.com/
KENS 5’s Barry Davis is the Emmy-winning host of Texas Outdoors. Learn more about him here.