Raku, retreats and a Wednesday morning start: Fatclay Pottery publishes its first full autumn season at the Hambledon studio

The hook: an autumn schedule built around the countryside site

Fatclay Pottery published its autumn 2026 programme on 2 September, and it is the clearest signal yet of what the business intends its second studio in Hambledon to be.

This is the first full season the ceramics studio has run with two sites. The original is at 67 Castle Road, Southsea; the newer one is at Pitt Hill Lane, Hambledon, PO7 4SG. The autumn listings split into three strands across both locations — weekly courses, one-off workshops, and specialist masterclasses led by guest tutors — but a notable share of the programme is pinned to PO7 alone.

What only happens at Hambledon

Raku is the headline. The studio describes it as immersing yourself in "the dramatic world of smoke and flame" to produce crackled, one-off pieces. It is an outdoor, open-flame process, and it is listed for Hambledon only.

The Hambledon-only list also covers the intermediate course block and a full-day animal sculpture workshop. Tasters in both wheel throwing and hand building run at each site, as does a Halloween-themed workshop pitched at all ages and skill levels.

When The News reported the second studio opening in August, it noted that the country location was what made Raku firing and longer residential formats possible. The autumn schedule is that idea turned into bookable dates.

A new three-day retreat

The programme's newest addition is a set of three-day pottery retreats, which the studio is launching with a 15 per cent early-bird discount and describes as limited in number.

The published inclusions are pottery classes for all levels from beginners to experienced throwers, accommodation in the surrounding countryside with food, and daily yoga and meditation. The extras run to a wine tasting and dinner at Hambledon Vineyard, a pizza night, and farm tours.

That is a meaningful shift in category. A weekend residential built around clay, yoga and a vineyard dinner is a short-break product, not a two-hour taster — and it sells the Hambledon setting rather than working around it.

The course ladder, and one date this week

Underneath the one-offs sits a more conventional structure. Fatclay runs a six-week wheel throwing course and a four-week hand-building course, covering shaping, trimming and glazing. Completing either unlocks full studio membership, which gives open studio time, equipment access and the studio community.

That matters for a rural site: membership is what turns a one-visit venue into somewhere people return to weekly.

The nearest fixed date is immediate. The "Next Steps" block runs on Wednesday mornings, with a new six-session run starting 9 September — tomorrow. Further ahead, a full-day porcelain throwing masterclass with guest potter Qian Liu is scheduled for 13 December, and the studio is also taking bookings for festive corporate workshops as an alternative to a conventional Christmas dinner.

Why it matters locally

Fatclay is not a chain. It began in Southsea in 2024 and, according to The News, expanded after what founder Matthew Bugeja called "overwhelming" customer support, with the same report noting the studio's ongoing work with schools, colleges, charities and community organisations.

For Waterlooville, Denmead, Horndean and the wider PO7 catchment, the practical point is that a specialist creative business has put a second trading site on a working farm nearby — and has now committed a full season of dates to it rather than treating it as an overflow room.

The autumn programme is published in full on the studio's own blog: Ready to get your hands dirty?