The potter's hand (2013)

Josiah Wedgwood's immense Frog Service commission gives ceramic ambition a production problem: materials must be obtained and an extraordinary quantity of skilled work delivered. Wilson follows family and commercial expansion as well as the celebrated maker. The sourcing of clay draws the story towards America and the Cherokee, widening the costs behind a beautiful object. Choose it for the uneasy meeting of craft, scientific curiosity and empire, rather than a small, cosy pottery-studio story.