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As someone who has done pottery for 5 years as a hobby, I am grateful that I never quit my job to pursue ceramics full time. Doing pottery “full time” to sustain yourself financially is a lot harder than people think at first. And strips the joy out.

Falling in love with pottery is easy, staying in love is a hard.

Some good goals are throwing bigger, throwing taller, making size and weight of item the right balance (it's harder to make nice light pieces).

Also some forms are more difficult, like closed round form, or handles!!! Practicing the hard stuff can be fun.

One thing I've focused on after several years is quality over quantity. It's easy to get caught up in the class cycle and want to make a bunch of stuff. If you have the home studio and time, which you said you do, you can spend more time on making pieces that should be kept and not keeping pieces that are not as good. Productive doesn't always equal more pieces.

Post some of your work! 😊

Goals are good, but I think generic goals like bigger, taller, thinner are not always helpful. Yes, these are always great things to work towards, but thin doesn't mean good. Big doesn't mean good. Purpose in a goal is better, something like my goal by the end of a year is to make an 8" tall pitcher. That requires more research, understanding, and practice.

I think an good goal is always to research more. Look at galleries and buy a coffee mug that really sticks out at you. Use it, learn from it, and figure out what makes it good. Some of my favorite pots I own are pots that I would never make myself or do things that I personally don't do in my work.

I’m not years and years in (about 1.5 years) but my goal for this year was to be a vendor at my favorite large craft fair in my city. I’m also working on it semi full time because I decided to take a career break (but not trying to be an artist for full time income.)

Anyway - applying for, making, and doing the fair pushed me to clarify my point of view as a maker, build a brand for the business, and because I had a reason to make a large volume of work I improved more in the 2 months between acceptance and the fair than in the entire last year combined probably.

I really recommend doing something like that even if you don’t want to do it more than once. It really was like the best intensive class I can imagine.

Think of it as a journey without an end. Don't worry about the destination, just enjoy the ride, and learn what you can as you go along. When you look at what you've done so far, some improvements will naturally occur to you; as you iterate on these designs they'll naturally get better. Ceramics is a craft that has no end of different techniques one can explore, that may or may not be something you decide to go on with. Mastering glaze-mixing, or various surface decoration methods like underglazing and overglazing can expand your vocabulary. You might try handbuilding, whether to make stand-alone objects or parts to incorporate into thrown work. Press-molding and slip-casting can change how you think of the process of making pots. And vessels aren't the only things you can make out of clay. Besides sculpture, there are innumerable practical items you can make, from tiles to switchplates. Just keep experimenting and trying new things, and you'll never run out of challenges.

I always have goals! Nothing huge, just areas of focus so I have some direction in my practice. Basically I’m obsessed with mugs, so I’m always working on getting the height and shape that I want. Also handles— I’ve worked on pulling handles, but am now trying some different handle creation methods that don’t have such a steep learning curve before they look really good. And glazing, my recent yen is for flux glazes and combos, so I’m playing with that. If you want suggestions, I think trimming nice feet was a good early focus.

I am trying to throw the perfect mug but the side projects keep showing up.

There are three aspects to clay that will take a lifetime to master. Each is its own branch of study.

1. The wet work- how you use your clay body through throwing or hand building.

2. Glaze- the chemistry and science behind how the glaze works. You can make your own glazes from scratch.

3. The kiln- electric, brick, Roku, salt, soda, ash. The history of kilns is extremely fascinating and varies from culture to culture based on the unique resources and needs of the community.

I’ll point back to muddybunnyhugger’s suggestions.

I’ve been a long time hobbiest and have only sold pieces at local fairs, mostly to get them out of my studio and free up storage for new pieces.

When I find myself stuck creatively I go back to trying to perfect my skills on 1-4lb cylinders, bowls, and vases. I focus on efficiency - get as much height as possible with less clay, symmetry - even walls no matter the form and shape, and form and shape consistency - trying to make multiple identical pieces. I haven’t tried to throw too big just because I struggle getting consistent time in the studio and want to spend my limited time at the wheel and glazing rather than doing reclaim. I’ll DM you if I think of the book, drawing a blank at the moment, but it’s a textbook that deep dives into shape variations of different forms and their impacts on visual interpretations. I’ll choose something from the book to mimic, choose a size, and try to make 12 of the same.

One of my first instructors told me there is no such thing as the perfect 1lb cylinder nor are two pieces ever identical. I think he meant the final piece, but I have interpreted this to mean the process. No two pieces throw the same, there are always unique adjustments that need to be made in real time, glazes turn out differently all the time. This stuck with me and influences how I choose my projects

Edit: Cary Illian’s “A Potters Workbook” is the book I mentioned

I tend to automatically set myself project based goals, and iteration combined with repetition on specific items until I am happy with it.  Come up with a vision based on something you have recently tried and learned and work to full execution of the vision.  Shape, balance, weight, details, decoration, glaze.  The nice thing about pottery foe me anyway, is thst all of those things are a result of the process so it becomes a balance of how do I best like making this and what do I want it to be.

Being specific is very helpful. I will take pictures of a lot of things that have cool features. Often it’s a shape, texture, or glaze interaction I want to recreate. I’ll then sketch out my ideas and try to throw with a specific end goal. If I can’t make that shape or recreate the surface design, I can look at exactly what went wrong, and that gives me something to work on.

Making sets has been a great learning experience for me, too. Starting with the same amount of clay and trying to throw matching pieces to the same shape and size has forced me to focus on certain steps. I’ve learned a lot through that!

I love making practical things and setting year goals. Last year I was determined to make a 64 piece dish set. It took me all year. Other than that, I like to focus on what I’m going to give to people for Christmas and birthdays and work around that. Also discovering new things like slip casting is fun!

I started a bit over 18 years ago and my goal every day is to not let it feel like something I have to do. I read a lot of books and blogs and magazines and IG and Pinterest give me lots of inspiration for things I haven’t tried.

I’ve spent a lot of time and money trying new things for fun such as mixing my own glazes trying to get a specific colour. I love test tiles. I make A LOT of test tiles for different clay bodies and glazes and glaze combos. Did I mention I love test tiles?

I also do a lot of hand building. I got bored with wheel throwing early on. About 3 years into it. I like imitating things that I come across to see if I can do it. They are never the same because they always have my spin on it but I know the inspiration and I find it a lot of fun to try and replicate a technique.

This winter I’ve gone in a completely different direction than I’ve ever done before and it’s so much fun. I’ve made about 100 test tiles so far and going over the results and analyzing and making changes to see how I can push a certain clay or colour is awesome! I’m at least 2 months from making something functional because I took a break for the month of December but by March I anticipate I’ll have a few things to fill a kiln and see how they come out.

I also don’t have a supply store under 2 hours from me and shipping is atrociously expensive so I love going thrifting for things I can use as tools. You can come up with some pretty neat tools by looking at shelves with the perspective of surface decoration or templates.

I’m in my third year and have just set myself some goals for 2026 - throwing bigger and also trying to make sets of the same size and shaped objects. My 2025 goal was to only make functional pieces and I was able to stick with that pretty well.

I would love to make some space for a wheel at my house - enjoy!

Iv been doing pottery about three years. I decided to learn one thing really really well then move onto something else. Iv made a variety of things but am basically practicing getting better and bigger on bowls. Chattering them, scraffito…. All kinds of glazes and bowl designs. Each different.. no two alike. I’m up to four lb bowls that are the right balance etc. feet match the curve and whatnot. Iv decided when I can perfect a five lbs bowl I’m going to teach myself moon jars with fancy lids. Go all in. I handbuild all sorts of other stuff but for me when I concentrated ( mostly but not always) on one type of thing I got much, much better at it. I throw a few plates if I really don’t want to make bowls. I threw some Christmas trees and pumpkins but I will stick with bettering my bowl making for a few more months then move onto a different kind of piece early in the new year. Works for me. Probably not for everyone. As some others have pointed out Iv been striving for lighter bigger taller but really concentrating on quality! Making stuff and not keeping it. I used to make ten things a day… now I make and keep one a week.

I’ve been doing this for about 8 years now, as a hobby. For the longest time, advancement to me was technical throwing skill, like I’ll set a goal to make tumbler or vases or some sort of shape.

But now that’s I’ve got the hang of that, im focusing on design and form. I’m super into pedestal shapes, so I’m throwing in segments now and attaching them.

I love tile patterns, so I’m trying to figure out how to copy those designs onto a pot, and how to get the cleanest cuts.

Also I love sparkly glazes, how to make them and use them?

After you sort out the basics, you’ll find that your mind will create its own goals just like mine did for me. It’s quite endless.

I decide on a focus area every year. At the start of my career it was to make thinner walls, make big bowls or practise more surface decoration techniques other than just layering glazes. One year was to take as many advanced workshops and learning opportunities I could. One year was to do a certain number of markets. Another year was to attend more gallery/networking opportunities and make more connections with other artists around me.

It’s been interesting to see how these goals have played out over the long term. At the start, goals were very technique based. Now they are a little more big picture. It’s helpful to do some deep thinking at this time of year after my markets and classes are finished for the season. Sometimes the goal wasn’t that helpful ultimately. Like, as a beginner focusing on thin walls was not the best idea and caused me some struggles, but I didn’t realize it until a few years later. Some of the advanced workshops weren’t that great, but others were very useful and created new directions in my work. In most cases, if the goal wasn’t that helpful for my work, the experiment itself was a success. It’s all learning.

When you say you want to get better - I suggest you examine what “better”means for you? Throwing thinner? Having more control over form? Increasing your glaze repertoire? Etc. for me, a year is a long time to set improvement goals, perhaps consider evaluating your progress quarterly. And remember to document where you are today (photos or keeping certain pieces) that you can use as comparisons. As long as you are moving in a forward direction, you are doing great!

I would personally love to throw bigger, more intricate pieces with more surface design this year. Maybe a couple pieces a session. Decorative bakeware in particular, maybe some decorative wall pieces.

I have been at it for a couple years now, focusing on form and function with some experimenting with commercial glazes. I spent the first year trying to work on form and process, this past year being able to move to more complex projects. Most recently started learning porcelain. I’ve made a couple lidded baking dishes at cone 10 this year which I’m particularly proud of, but overall more focus on quantity and simple glazes.

Eventually I would like to work on reproducing pieces for sale, but currently I am taking a break from this session to hopefully refresh my creativity. I’ve found that pottery recently has been more of a chore - trying to squeeze my work into a busy schedule - which is always my indicator to take a break from something. But I’m excited to come back to it in February. :)