Why Make Pottery Trivets
Trivets are practical, giftable, and easy to make. A flat slab of fired clay naturally resists heat, protects surfaces, and provides a decorative landing pad for hot dishes. They are perfect for experimenting with glazes, textures, and surface treatments.
Building Pottery Trivets
Basic Slab Trivet
Roll a slab about half an inch thick. Cut to your desired shape — square, round, hexagonal, or freeform. Six to eight inches across is useful. Add three or four small clay feet to the bottom.
Textured Tile Trivet
Press texture into a fresh slab before cutting the trivet shape. Use lace, fabric, leaves, rubber stamps, or found objects.
Heat Resistance
Fired clay is inherently heat-resistant — it has already survived kiln temperatures far exceeding anything from a kitchen. For normal stovetop-to-table temperatures, pottery trivets handle heat without any concern.
Decorating Trivets
Underglaze Painting
Paint designs on bisque-fired trivets using underglazes, then apply a clear glaze over the top for vivid, detailed designs.
Sgraffito
Apply colored slip to the leather-hard slab, then carve designs through the colored layer to reveal the clay body beneath. This creates dramatic contrast.
Learn from Stephen Jepson
Stephen's pottery video lessons cover slab-building, surface decoration, and glazing techniques ideal for trivets. One-time purchase, lifetime access to all lessons.
Trivets as Creative Canvas
The flat surface of a trivet is perhaps the most forgiving canvas in all of pottery. Unlike bowls or vases where shape and function demand attention, a trivet lets you focus entirely on surface decoration. This makes them ideal for developing your decorative vocabulary. Try a new underglaze painting technique on a trivet before committing to a full dinnerware set. Test a sgraffito pattern. Experiment with layered glazes. Each trivet becomes a self-contained artwork that also happens to protect your table from hot dishes.
Consider making a series of trivets that tell a visual story — four seasons, a botanical collection, or an abstract color progression. Displayed on a kitchen wall between uses, a series of decorated trivets becomes a gallery installation. When company arrives, they come off the wall and onto the table, seamlessly transitioning from art to function. This dual purpose is one of the most compelling aspects of handmade trivets.