Send us Fan Mail Many makers treat consistency as the goal and cyclical creative rhythms as something to fix — but Shalya Marsh, of Shalya Marsh Studios, has built a three-decade career on making, unmaking, and remaking herself: sculptor to potter, employee to entrepreneur, solo maker to (almost) business owner with an assistant. Her conversation digs into whether "balance" is really the wrong word for what most working makers experience, and whether cyclical bursts of energy — not steady dai...

Send us Fan Mail You already know what it feels like to open a cupboard, see a mug, and know exactly who made it before you ever check for a signature. That's the instinct artists have always had. So why does the word "branding" make so many of us tune out? Jessie, one half of the duo behind Inkpot Creative, breaks it down: That same kind of recognition (built on purpose) is all branding actually is. Consistency matters more than any single logo. Niching down doesn't mean turning people away....

Send us Fan Mail As makers, we're told to define our ideal audience and nail our strategy before we ever start — but what if the real strategy reveals itself only after you've already begun? Robin Corradino of Rob Ceramics joins to unpack how she built a thriving wholesale and consignment-based business almost by accident, never doing a single craft market until years into selling her work. Her approach challenges the conventional wisdom around audience-building entirely: by simply making wha...

Send us Fan Mail Most of us have been told (or have told ourselves one way or another) that building a successful creative business means picking a lane and staying in it. But what happens when the lane you've built starts to feel more like a cage, and the work that once lit you up becomes just another obligation you can't motivate yourself to do? Christina Orthwein's journey from production potter to sculptor to jewelry maker and back again is a raw and honest look at how the pressure to mon...

Send us Fan Mail Many of us assume that when demand for our work finally arrives, we're supposed to rise to meet all of it — that suddenly the rules of supply and demand apply to us the same way they apply to everyone else. What if deliberately not scaling up isn't leaving opportunity on the table, but is actually the thing that makes the work worth wanting in the first place? In her conversation with Debi Stoliar of Curiosibee Ceramics,, we explore what it looks like to hold two seemingly co...

Send us Fan Mail We spend so much energy measuring success by how visible or "full time" our craft looks from the outside, but the version of making that actually sustains you might look completely different from what you think it should. Over the last 5 years, since we first interviewed Camille Beckles (of Camille at the Wheel), on our debut episode here at the Maker’s Playbook, Camille has had the opportunity to say yes to the most exciting, challenging, and community-driven ceramics opport...

Send us Fan Mail For fifteen years, the first piece of advice out of my mouth to anyone asking about self-employment has been the same: keep the outside income as long as you possibly can. And for fifteen years, I wasn't doing it. Until now. In this solo episode, I'm sharing a significant personal update — what led me to take an outside job after fifteen years of running my own businesses, what burnout actually feels like versus just being really tired, and the surprising freedom that comes f...

Send us Fan Mail Most of us have been told — implicitly or explicitly — that success as a maker means growth: more followers, more orders, more revenue. But what if the real question isn't how big can this get, but what do I actually want from this? Taylor Friese of Maker Bakery built a waitlist that stretches years into the future not by chasing a bigger audience, but by getting radically clear about who she makes work for and why — and letting that clarity do the marketing for her. And when...

Send us Fan Mail If you've ever Googled "how to price my art" or "how to grow a creative business" hoping someone would just hand you the right answer — this episode is for you. Rebecca digs into why making confident business decisions as an artist or maker isn't about finding the perfect formula. It's about treating your art business like a science experiment: forming a hypothesis, testing it, analyzing what actually happens, and adjusting from there. Whether you're a full-time maker relying...

Send us Fan Mail Most of us assume that building a creative business takes years of groundwork before the work can speak for itself — but what happens when the work takes off before you've had time to figure out the business? Aaron Raymond of Redacted Ceramics went from renting a wheel for a week to running a full-time pottery business in under two years, and his story raises a quiet but important question: does the conventional wisdom about "paying your dues" actually hold up? As Aaron share...