When all the pieces have been made they will stack on a pole that’s been placed 2’ into the ground. That will keep them stable and safe.
While the hand-built pedestal I built last week went together quickly, the ones I'm throwing are not. In the first post on making these tall stands, I mentioned my friend Jennifer, who threw three large bowls that I'll use as the bases. They have been trimmed and finished. I then threw three cylinders to start creating the pedestal columns. I was going along swimmingly until I got cocky about how well it was going and tried to bite off more than I could chew.
I'd been adding about three inches at a time, and the going was slow. On Sunday, I added six inches, hit a lumpy spot, and lost the perfectly symmetrical look I was going for on two of them. Monday morning, I wondered how I would fix this? I honestly didn't know. I thought about cutting off the offending part, but, first, I tried to sculpt my way to a graceful shape. By the end of the workday, I reshaped the pieces using the wheel and decided they still had grace. They're getting big and are almost too heavy for me to move on and off the wheel. I'm going to bring these to a close and continue building height with some other shapes.
The bottom of the cylinder sits nicely in the foot of the bowl and is curved to match the bowl’s curved bottom. At 27” they’ll just fit in the kiln.