Made the ugliest teapot in my class and it out-poured everything

Ugly teapots that pour well are a whole lineage, and I'm proud to be in it. Mine came out of a Thursday night class two winters ago, a squat brown thing with a handle I attached crooked and never fixed. My husband calls it 'the toad' and it still brews two mugs every Sunday. The spout on it is nothing special to look at, just a short pulled tube set low on the body, and I think that's exactly why it works. Every fancy teapot I've made since with a long elegant spout glugs or dribbles unless I pour it like I'm defusing something.

The teacher in my class had a saying that stuck with me: the clay doesn't care what it looks like, only where the hole is. Spout angle and where it sits on the body matter way more than the profile. If the spout opening ends up level with or just above the water line when the pot is full, you get a clean pour. Mine sits low, which is why it never dribbles even when it's packed full.

Keep using him daily too. The glaze on my toad has gone shiny on the handle from my hands and I wouldn't trade that patina for any of the pretty ones sitting unused in the cabinet.

I was on the other side of a pour-off like that last spring. My teapot was the one people complimented, a smooth little stoneware number in a celadon glaze I mixed myself, and I was quietly smug about it for three weeks. Then I actually used it every day and realized it dribbles from the left side of the spout no matter how slowly I pour. My husband keeps a folded towel next to it on the counter like it's part of the tea ritual now. What I've learned since is that the inside matters way more than the outside. A friend who has thrown pots for years took mine apart mentally at her kitchen table and pointed out that my spout opening has a slight lip that catches the last of the stream. Hers is just cut clean and angled, nothing fancy, and it never drips. So these days I tell anyone starting a teapot class to worry less about the profile and more about where the spout meets the body. Get that junction right and you can cover the thing in spikes or fins or googly eyes and it will still serve you well for years. Mine sits in the cabinet while the lumpy practice one from week two gets all the morning use, which still stings a little.

Those textured lumpy bodies also give you somewhere to actually grip a hot pot, which the smooth ones never do. I made a bumpy stoneware teapot years back and the knobbly bits near the handle turned out to be the only reason I coud pull it out of the oven mid-brew without a mitt. Mine dribbles though, so clearly the bumps only buy you so much. What cone did you fire him to? Mine at cone 6 has chipped two spikes alredy and my kids treat that like a scandal.

My kid does the same naming thing with everthing that comes out of my studio shelf. We've got a vase called 'Blobby' and a mug called 'Sir Chippy' that he refuses to let me donate. somethig about a named pot makes it immune to being thrown out, apparantly.

Also, the 'a choice' comment from your instructor is peak teacher diplomacy. Mine used to say 'interesting' in that exact same flat tone and we all knew what it meant. Funny how those ones ussually end up being the keepers though.

Update: read these while washing him up tonight and tried the grip thing someone mentioned. Carried him full and hot across the kitchen with one hand, no mitt, thumb hooked on one of the lumps. Worked exactly like you said. Also told my kid some pots on here have names like Sir Chippy, and now Spike apparently needs a title. He's Lord Spike of the Kitchen Shelf now, no negotiation.