Pottery Classes for Beginners in Denver: Wheel, Handbuilding, or Face Mug?

How to start: pick the path that sounds fun: wheel, handbuilding, or one night. You do not need a pottery personality yet.

If you want pottery classes for beginners in Denver, you do not need to pick a whole personality yet. At Claya you pick a path: the wheel, handbuilding, or a single face-mug night. All three are built for people who have never touched clay. Six-week courses are $300–$325. The face mug workshop is $60.

We are at 3440 Walnut Street in RiNo. The full menu is on pottery classes in Denver, with a plainer overview on beginner pottery classes and numbers on pricing.

Wheel, if you want the spin

Intro to Wheel Throwing is six weeks of wedging, centering, pulling walls, trimming, and glazing. You make bowls, cups, and plates, in a small group, with a friendly teacher who keeps things relaxed. Clay, tools, aprons, the glaze library, and firing are included for class. No per-piece firing fees.

The six-week intro is $300–$325. Wednesday 6:15 to 8:45 PM with Emili Kaiman ($325) is in session now and sold out. Open sections: Friday 12 to 2:30 PM with Jesse ($300), starting October 30. Monday daytime 12–2:30 PM All Levels with Mary (Nov 9–Dec 14, $300) is also open. Monday evening 6–8:30 PM Intro with Mary (starts November 9) is sold out. Monday evening with Mary is in session and sold out. Seats move: use the class page for what’s open.

Handbuilding, if you want to skip the wheel

Intro to Handbuilding is six weeks. The next one is Planters with Ethan, Sundays 1:30 to 4 PM starting November 1, $300. Pinch pots, coils, slabs, and surface work, then glazed pieces you made without a wheel. Same inclusion list: clay, tools, glaze and firing for class, plus student open studio during the course (clay during open studio is available for purchase on the shelf near the aprons).

Prefer Sundays? Ethan’s Intro to Wheel Throwing: Dinnerware Sets (Sundays 10 to 12:30 PM starting November 1, $300) is sold out.

Pick this if you like shaping things with your hands, or if the wheel sounds like more machine than you want on night one. Plenty of potters never center a lump of clay and still make a whole table’s worth of work.

Face mug, if you want one night and a character

The Hand Built Face Mugs workshop is not a beginner course with fewer weeks. It is one night. $60. You build a mug, sculpt a face, and glaze it yourself, and Claya fires it. Taught by Kate Barry. No date is on the calendar right now; see one-night workshops for what is next. Kept to a small group. Clay, tools, glazes, and firing included. Pickup is about a week later.

Choose this if you want a single finished object and a low-stakes first night, not a six-week practice. It will not teach you to throw. It will send you home having made a mug with a face.

What six-week classes add

Both intro courses include student open studio while you are enrolled (clay for open studio practice is available for purchase at the studio). That is extra practice, not a public hours thing and not a 3-hour block you reserve. Enrolled students can come any of these times:

  • Monday 10am–6pm
  • Friday 10am–6pm
  • Saturday 10am–6pm

Retail Studio Hours are separate: Mon/Thu/Fri 10:00 AM–6:00 PM; Saturday 10:00 AM–6:00 PM; Sunday or any day by appointment.

One night first?

Learn the wheel, then keep going. If you want a single evening before a six-week commitment, start with Try the Pottery Wheel (from $75, Friday and Saturday evenings).

How to choose

Membership is the later step, not the first one. Extended Founding is $140 a month. Buy online, then come in for agreement, shelf, and keycode after setup. See studio membership when you already know you want a keycode. Until then, book a class and come make something.

Every class on this list meets at Claya, a beginner-friendly pottery studio in Denver, at 3440 Walnut Street in RiNo.

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