The Early Startup Of A Clay Business | Hannah Lenhart | Episode 408

Hannah Lenhart | Episode 408

Hannah Lenhart is a recent graduate of Fairmont State University where she both a BA in Ceramics and Sculpture and a BS in Business Administration May of 2017. Since graduation Hannah has been working and living in the beautiful hills of West Virginia in her home studio where she has been busy preparing her studio space, stocking inventory, and transitioning from being a student to starting a small business. Hannah’s ceramics career began when she took her first ceramics class her second semester of college, and since then ceramics has been the center of her life. Experimentation plays a huge role in Hannah’s studio practice. She enjoys learning and finding new ways to decorate and manipulate clay. Hannah currently works with a cone 6 white stoneware and uses colored slips and carving techniques to decorate her work.

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How are you finding inspiration for bringing your work to a higher level?

Are you asking what influences I look at for inspiration?

Yes, let’s go with that.

Well, I am addicted to social media, which is a terrible thing to say but I love going on there and try to analyze how people make stuff and how they photograph their work and make it really pop and what they are doing to grow their businesses. I try to dive really deep into specific artists on their websites and try to see their histories and see what avenues they went through and which ones were the most successful for them and try to strategical plan my movements to give me the best outcomes. It sounds really nice, but believe me I still make so many mistakes, but it is a constant learning thing. I think of other people who were in the mud with you to see what they are doing can be really beneficial to learn from what they are doing.

From you business degree, what is one of the most important things that you carry into your art business?

I would say keeping track of your books, really. I am not a bookkeeper but I do take some of the things I learned from accounting and I have spread sheets all over my computer that let me know my expenses for the month. They let me know my profits from that month and I also keep track of whenever I get new materials or supplies, I keep track of the cheapest way to get them. I would say the money aspect is what I really took away from business school.

What kind of tools are you using for your income etc? You said spreadsheets but tell me specifically what tools you use.

Just simple Excel sheets. I think Excel is one of the most amazing things ever becasue you can use formulas to really track things in really spectacular ways. Right now it’s Excel. My mom’s a bookkeeper and she has talked about Quick books before but right now all of my business is kept on Excel.

You are very colorful in your surface decoration. Why is color such an important part of your work?

I don’t know. It was really funny because whenever I started doing pottery when I was a freshman in college I kind of wanted to go the more traditional route with the dark reds and the browns and the blues. But as I continued working it just kind of happened naturally. I got a lot of influences through paintings and sculptures and I felt that I was really drawn toward art that was really colorful. So I went up to my pottery professor and I told him about my interest and he introduced me to the world of colored slips and he made me some stains. I got really jazzed about it and I got really excited to use all those bright colors. So it was a natural progression for me.

If there was one skill that you could add to your making what would it be?

I guess just more skilled in general, especially with throwing. Throwing for me is still very difficult. I am learning all the time but I am not as fast as I would like to be. So I would love to be quicker at throwing.

If there is one business skill you would add what would it be?

That’s a hard one because there are so many. I guess right now it would be marketing. Just figuring out how to best put my work out there and how to best market that.

What is you favorite social media platform?

It has to be Instagram. I think that place is amazing for artists. It is a great place to show people what I do whenever I am applying for shops and galleries. It is a good tool to use.

How do you find community for yourself while you are working alone?

That definitely is a huge struggle. There will be days where I don’t see anyone besides my family. I kind of combat that by staying connected to the university that I went to. They have a lot of shows throughout the year and I like to attend those and I stay in contact with people that I went to school with. And just making more conscious efforts to leave the studio and meet people and connect with people.