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Every piece of our jewelry is made-by-hand in Saltillo, Mississippi, by Susan Yeoman, Betty Sandlin, and Michelle McCaleb.
Susan ,Michelle and Betty are ceramic artists that work together to create truly unique handmade stoneware and porcelain jewelry. Each piece of GullyBug Jewelry is carefully designed and created out of stoneware or porcelain clay, glazed and fired to become wearable art. No two pieces are designed and glazed exactly the same so when you wear GullyBug Jewelry it is truly as unique as you are! Making GullyBug Jewelry is a fun, yet very meticulous process. The stunning colors and textures that come from designing, glazing, and firing the clay make it well worth the hard work! To give you an idea of the time it takes to create our jewelry, even a single bead takes two days from wet clay to the glazed firing. The coolest thing about creating our ceramic jewelry is that we have no limits. We aren't restricted to designs and materials such as beads that anyone can purchase from a store! |
About our name:
Susan's aunt, Bernice Brown Arnold, (1913-2001) loved to talk about the days of her youth. Among one of her many stories reminiscing her days as aschool girl, she explained to us a favorite recess game called GullyBug. It was a team game that was played between two gullies. One person was “It” and would give a command for the children on the two teams to run from one gully to the other. If they were tagged in route, they were gully bugs. After she told us that story, we called Aunt Bernice, GullyBug. She liked the nickname, so it stuck. Since we had no name for our pottery business, and since our pottery was going to be displayed in her home, we thought it only befitting to call ourselves GullyBug Pottery.
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A Note from Susan:
My interest in pottery began about 15 years ago when a potter of 30 years and her family moved from South Africa to our small town of Saltillo,Mississippi. After meeting Antoinette in church and discovering she was a potter but had no immediate place to work, my husband and I offered her the use of our cluttered barn as a makeshift studio. She took us up on our offer and began throwing her beautiful porcelain pots, making it look totally effortless. She would often fire these pieces in what she called “pit firings” out in our yard. Thus began my journey into the world of pottery! Before three years had passed, Antoinette had moved into her own studio…and I was hooked. I kept fooling around with clay, reading book after book and enrolling in workshops. I fell in love with the way clay handles. While I enjoy making pieces of traditional pottery as well, over the past 9 years GullyBug Pottery has evolved into much more than just bowls and mugs. Since the first pair of earrings from stoneware clay, GulyBug jewelry has come a very long way! My best friend Betty Sandlin joined me in my pottery endeavor since the very beginning. She worked beside me through countless hours of trial and error that have made GullyBug Pottery what it is today. Michelle McCaleb is also a great friend who has been working with us for the past 8 years. Michelle gained a passion and skill for working with clay. She was a natural from the beginning and jumped right into learning my techniques, creating new techniques, and creating unique designs for our jewelry and loves to make pottery as well. Susan, Betty and Michelle are now all business partners and together we are GullyBug Pottery and Jewelry Design. We love working together and are looking forward to designing and creating GullyBug Jewelry and pottery for many years to come! |