£25.00
What is a Bothy? Scots word for a basic free-to-use Shelter in the Scottish wilderness for outdoor explorers. Usually old farm cottages or huts which have been restored to provide basic overnight shelter from the sometimes harsh Scottish evenings in the wild! Typically located in remote mountain areas usually miles away from public roads. Bothies are open to anyone who finds them and needs them. Mostly backpackers, climbers, cyclists and hikers.
This unique and extremely basic accommodation is free of charge to use in the interest of helping those in need. More often than not you will need to find your own fuel for a fire and make sure you bring drinking water with you and torches. Some are equipped with beds, some even with cookers and some very kindly with blankets. Some are even maintained by local farmers and supply eggs or bread for cooking. No electricity is provided but a roof over your head is sometimes all that you need for the night, especially if lost!
You can see some of these bothies while driving around Scotland up in the mountains and if you are lucky you can sometimes spot a glowing light from the windows and smoke plumbing out of the chimney in the evenings. This light you can see in the evenings, not just from bothies, but also cottages, homes and lanterns all over the world, particularly at twilight I lovingly refer to as “Orange Glow” and i always have to point out to my wife as driving or walking by said “orange glow!” often with great excitement.
I find this special light to be one of the cosiest things you can see, especially knowing that people would have seen this glow from humans lighting up the evenings since the beginning of civilization, so of course I had to create some of this feeling for myself in the form of a small black glowing bothy, with an added smokey chimney.
This little black bothy is handmade by me using a very strong and stabilised, slightly textured Raku Clay to emulate the rugged but strong Bothies of the Scottish and Northern English countryside. Decorated with a white crackle Raku glaze roof.
This Bothy has been glazed at 1000 degrees and then taken fresh from the mega hot kiln, orange/white hot, and then put straight into a metal container filled with straw and woodchips which sets alight (very alight!) quickly followed by a covering of more straw and then the lid closed tightly to starve the glaze of oxygen and create wonderful effects on the glaze and blackening the unglazed parts. This Raku firing creates entirely organic and unpredictable results, it’s an extremely exciting process and slightly risky, especially for one’s eyebrows but I assure you I take all necessary precautions.
Included with this Bothy is a flicker glow LED candle to recreate your own authentic “Orange Glow’ through its little windows, an incense cone to make a beautifully scented smoke plume out of the chimney and a small incense cone stand so you don’t have to worry about burning your sideboard or shelf, wherever you decide to place your new cosy, smokey Bothy.
