The Saga of the Dad Cup

Why I'll probably never do this again (but I'm so glad I did it once)

About a month ago I got the idea to make some mugs for Father's Day. There's something about fathers that just conjures up images of a dad with a mug. So I wanted to make a mug for the fathers of the world. I was actually watching Love on the Spectrum and there was one scene where James's dad showed a mug that James gave him when he was young that he was still drinking coffee out of thirty years later. It looked so familiar to me (I think maybe I had given the same mug to my own dad when we were little?). Anyway, the mug looks like this:

So even though it was only early May (Father's Day is June 21st), things take a long time in ceramics, so I had to put my idea into production immediately. I worked out the design, Gaby threw the mugs beautifully, and I had about one day to get my illustrations done so I could order the stamps in time (it was going to take about 9 days to process and ship). We attached the handles and — with very careful monitoring and attendance — it looks like no handles cracked.

I finally received the stamps (they looked great) and we were ready to get stamping. Only they did not work nearly as well as I had hoped, and because the plan was to color in the line work, we ended up hand painting each and every one. There are two illustrations on the cups, one on each side, and it was taking about 25 minutes per side. So 50 minutes per cup, with 20 cups (well, one broke)... that's 16 hours!! — and that's not even counting the throwing, trimming, or glazing. These were really turning out to be a labor of love. I even had to call Joonbug in at the last minute to help me paint them (he did a great job). Here's how they look (this is pre-fired, so the colors aren't true to how they'll come out of the kiln):

The cups are getting bisque fired now and we are scheduled to glaze them on Monday June 8th. They should be out of the kiln by end of week and ready to ship Monday June 15th. It has been a marathon to get these finished! I will probably never do it like this again, lol. I'm so paranoid something will go wrong with the glazing after all that painting — I've been strategizing about glaze techniques in my downtime.

I'm not sure if all 19 will survive the whole process, and I don't have a photo of the finished mug yet, so I'm not putting these online until they're done. That way I can get a proper photo and people will know what to expect. If you'd like one, please text DADCUP to (833) 494-0696 and I will send you a text as soon as they're ready and available to purchase.

I really do think these cups are pretty special and would make an easy new favorite.

I can't wait to share the finished product, If all goes according to plan they'll end up with the same finish as this plate:

Okay, back to packing up orders. Until next week!

🫶🏽 Hana