Our collaboration with Carly Breame

It’s Monday morning and the studio smells of roasted coffee and wine. The kiln has been on overnight with around 150 ceramic diffusers inside, and large ceramic pipes filled with coffee husks have transformed into ash for glazing. The air is warm and toasty. 

The day started, as it always does, with coffee. Lights on, fill the kettle, prepare the V60. I use ground coffee from Dark Woods and today I have blended Driftwood with decaf, a somewhat controversial mix that I am sure would not be approved by coffee enthusiasts.

Usually the coffee is sipped while perched at the end of the table, reviewing the tasks for the day; it has become a firm ritual. The table itself is covered in bisque-fired cups waiting to be glazed in the coffee husk glaze, their pale clay surfaces blending with the warmth of the morning light. But today was coffee on the go, as I began by unloading the large vessels of wine pomace from the car. The morning scent of roasted coffee from the kiln gradually gave way to a deeper, wine-soaked aroma, and the studio felt alive.

The pomace is from Matt Gregory Vineyard in Leicestershire, a young but quietly ambitious producer making still wines such as Pinot Noir. I first met Matt about a year ago through Lee Coad from Angela’s in Margate. I had been using dried wine grapes in Italy and wanted to explore how the same process might translate to the UK’s growing wine industry.

For this project, the grapes act as vessels for smoke firing, infusing the clay with a soft, natural tone that feels deeply tied to the theme of Essence. Once fired, they turn to ash, material I will later use to glaze a series of wine decanters and cups.

The diffusers themselves carry another layer of transformation. Coffee husks from Dark Woods are mixed into the clay body, increasing its porosity so that it can absorb and slowly release scent. Both materials move through cycles of change, leaving behind tone and texture whilst feeding later cycles of work.

Outside, the nearby mills make faint industrial noises, and the studio feels full of quiet movement. The kiln hums softly in the background, the air heavy with the mixed scents of coffee and wine. I think about how scent has always been part of this space, but never part of the work itself. People often ask whether the glazes I make from coffee husks or wine grapes retain their scent; they instinctively lift a cup to their nose. Until this collaboration, the answer has always been no.

Working on this diffuser made me think differently about how materials connect to our senses, and this collaboration brought those worlds together. The fragrance created moves through a ceramic form shaped by my process, bringing together what has always surrounded my practice but never entered it. The diffuser holds both tactility and scent, a quiet meeting point between their world and mine.

Many of my pieces are made for the rituals of the dining table, objects that invite touch, conversation and shared moments over food and drink. The diffuser feels like an extension of that idea, an object designed for the home that engages more than sight or touch, something that lingers in the air, connecting space, material and memory.

It has also opened up new thoughts about tactility and scent in my work, how these experiences might move beyond the home and onto the body. I have begun exploring this idea through ceramic jewellery, imagining wearables that carry both material memory and sensory presence.

As I sit here, second coffee of the day, the air still carries that faint sweetness from the grapes and roasted coffee smell. It is a small reminder of how scent and material shape the spaces we live and work in, how essence, in the end, is what remains when everything else fades.