I went to the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019!

こんにちは！ワルシャワで駐在妻をしている、はりぃです。

I went to the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019!

The Boleslawiec Pottery Festival attracts Polish tableware lovers from around the world.
It was more fun than I had imagined and I had a blast ^^.

Here’s a photo-heavy report on the festivities!

What is Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019?

The Boleslawiec Pottery Festival is an annual pottery festival held in Boleslawiec, a small town in western Poland.

Polish tableware, popularly known as Polish Pottery in Japan, is made in this small town of Boleslawiec.

During the festival, various workshops in Boleslawiec, large and small, gather in the central square to hold a large scale pottery market!
More than 60 stores will be open, including general merchandise and food stalls.

This is a very popular event that attracts Polish tableware fans and buyers from all over the world.

Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019 was Polish tableware heaven!

The main attraction of the Boleslawie Pottery Festival is the Polish tableware shopping!

I really enjoyed seeing all the pottery from the workshops that you can’t buy in Warsaw, and seeing so many designs I’d never seen before!

The tents of the various workshops were lined up in the town’s central square.

Zakłady and Ceramica Artistichna are the largest Bolesławiec pottery workshops.
The tents were therefore also very large and conspicuous.

The next company that stood out was WIZA. They were having a sale and there was always a line around the tent.

In addition, there were many other small workshops that opened their stalls.

Large workshops have factories and stores in the center of Boleslawiec, but small workshops are often located on the outskirts of town, making it difficult to visit them on your own.

Therefore, it is a great opportunity to see This Boleslawiec Pottery Festival is a rare chance to see many products from small workshops at once ^^.

CERAMIKA GALIA had a cute floral pattern. Many of the designs were spring-like.

ARKADIA had a lot of blue-based ceramics. austere.

This is CERAMIKA ARTYSTYCZNA Dalia, which was also mostly blue.

Even the inside of the rim of the mug was designed in a fashionable way.

Kaola, which appears to be an American-affiliated workshop, is actually a popular source of Polish tableware in the U.S. as well.

Many of the designs were original and stylish.

It’s not just Polish tableware! The whole town is in a festive mood♪

The Boleslawiec Pottery Festival is not only about shopping for Polish tableware. The whole town is in a festive mood.

There were many food trucks lined up around the central plaza where each workshop set up their tents, and I was able to observe the festival while eating and walking around ^^.

Pictured above is oscypek, a sheep’s milk cheese, a specialty of southern Poland.

Smoked dark cheese with berry jam. Not too peculiar and delicious ^^.

Also, the waffles called GOFRY are delicious! I recommend it with fresh cream and fruit (z bitą śmietaną i owocami).

I had heard beforehand that it would be extremely crowded during the pottery festival, so I was worried, but it was actually not that bad.
Perhaps it was because it was a weekday in the first half of the festival.

I could take my time looking at the pottery, there was almost no line to buy snacks at the food trucks, and the restaurants in the plaza were easy to get into without reservations.

Don’t miss the workshop store during the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival!

During the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival, there are also events, sales events, and deals at the factories and stores of each Polish tableware manufacturer!

The stores at each studio have a larger selection of goods than at the festival site, and there are also many bargain outlet items. If you have time, we recommend that you visit the stores as well.

A look at Ceramica Artistichna S.p.A.

The Ceramica factory was the busiest of all the workshops in Boleslawiec.

A large exhibition and sales event was held in the yard in front of the factory.

It was very easy to see the products arranged by each design. It was very tempting to buy. â

A little Japanese autumn foliage designup

Ceramica’s standard pattern, Princess seriesup

There were lots of new designs and a series of designs we’d never seen before in Warsaw!

These are the two I was wondering about.

Both are designer one-of-a-kind pieces known as unicuts.
That’s why the price is so high and I can’t afford it at all ^^; (a mug is 6,000 yen…)

In addition to the sales event, there were other events such as painting demonstrations by famous designers and a hands-on corner.

There was free beverage service on the lawn in front of the factory, as well as an on-site Polish restaurant. It was a great place to take a break when tired of shopping ^^.

Other permanent outlet stores were also open as usual. There, you can get great deals on outlet and second-class products.â

Polish Tableware Factory Tour♪ @ Zakłady S.A.

The Zakłady factory was offering factory tours as an event during the festival!

English tours were offered several times an hour, and reservations were not required.

Shape makingup

The cup handles were attached one by one by hand. This is a lot of work!

The shape of the mug is completed. Now it is time for baking and painting.

Inside the factory, there is a pumpkin before painting ^^.

The stamping and painting process. I forget the number of personalities, but they have over 100 painters!

A plate after stamping. It will now be coated with a coat of glue and baked again.

During the tour, we were also able to experience stamping. It is more difficult than I thought to stamp neatly. It is a craftsmanship.

The tour took about 30 minutes. Very satisfying tour!

I knew that Polish tableware was handmade, but seeing the actual production process makes me appreciate and love it more ^^.

Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019 Schedule & Map

For those visiting the festival next year and beyond, here is a brief overview of the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019 program.
The program for next year and beyond is unknown at this time, so just FYI!

Please refer to the official website for more information. (I’m not sure if they use it every year, the link below is program2017, but it is the 2019 schedule.)

Official HP http://swietoceramiki.pl/program2017/program-eng

I visited during the first half of the festival, when many of the pottery markets in the central plaza had begun closing after 8 pm.

Discover the Boleslawiec Pottery Festival Map

What a surprise! Boleslawiec Pottery Festival Map in Japanese I found it on the Internet!
Ceramica’s Japanese import agent created it for us.

https://ceramika-art.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/map-1.pdf

A Japanese map of a festival in a small town in Poland is a miracle.

Most of the workshop’s stores are open even on holidays

Since the day I visited the Pottery Festival was just a holiday, I was concerned about whether the stores of the various workshops would be open for business.
(In Poland, almost all stores are closed on Sundays and holidays, with the exception of restaurants.)

Turns out, most of the stores were open for business!
It looks like they were indeed open for business during the once-a-year earning season ^^;

Only one store, Manufaktura, was not open.Maybe they just closed early because I was there around evening.

For your information, Manufaktura has three stores in Boleslawiec. I am not sure if the large factory/store a little further from the center of town was open or not, as I did not have time to visit it.

Don’t worry, of course, the tents and restaurants at the festival site were open for business ^^.

Boleslawiec Pottery Festival 2019, Loot

My first Boleslawiec Pottery Festival, and I really enjoyed it!

Here is the Polish Pottery I got this time.

I wanted to buy new tableware, so I took the plunge and bought a large quantity ^^.

I’ve been using 100-yen plates and prize cups for years, but now it’s time to replace them (lol).

I spent all my limited time shopping, so I could not see the main event of the festival at all this time… ^^;

I’ll visit more leisurely next year!

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