Beauty Marks

http://a4.files.xovain.com/

Sometimes you get lucky.

Another good fail

Got to do some turning yesterday, and produced three roughly successful bowls.  This one, however, was not one of them.  Obviously, the wall thickness got away from me.  I laughed out loud when I noticed the light coming though.  

A few lessons learned here.  I am chasing a certain curve to the bowl, which this one does well.  It rises from the base of the bowl with the curve tightening toward the rim.  That was the good part.  But there were a few mistakes here.  The inner curve of the bowl should leave a bit of material at the rim (say 1/2") and then thin toward the middle and then add a little more back at the base.  This makes a bowl that is easy to pick up and feels good in the hand.  There is something to grab onto. Obviously, in this case I let the middle thickness get too thin--past 1/4" and things go bad.  Second lesson, the decorative incised lines were my undoing here, and as I look at the outside I realize that I really don't like the bottom two lines.  The top line helps accentuate the form, but the bottom two seem egregious.  Finally, the bead at the rim is too big and seems too close to the recess below it.  It fees crowded up there.  I may cut this one in half so I can really see the profile.