Made in Sausalito

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Made in Sausalito
Jeffery Cross
By taking up Heath Ceramics, two designers find
their way to tangible satisfaction. by Sheila Himmel
One day in 2002, Robin Petravic and Catherine Bailey
came across a dusty, flat-roofed factory in a Sausalito
tidal basin. The couple was going through a bit of a
career crisis. In industrial and product design, they’d
had plenty of experience making presentations. But
they wanted to make things. “I worked on cellphones
that were part cameras and cameras that were part
phones,” Petravic, MFA ’97, recalls. “Ninety-eight percent of the time, it just turned into a presentation.”
Bailey says, “There’s something about being a
human being and having hands. It’s important to use
them, and not just on a computer keyboard.”
The Sausalito factory struck them as “a ghost
building”—but it remained the home of Heath Ceramics. Since its 1947 founding by Edith and Brian
Heath, the firm had focused on craftsmanship and
personal relationships, an artisan version of manufacturing. Design pioneer Edith Heath had melded
modernist Bauhaus principles (less is more; form follows function; truth to materials) with handcrafted
simplicity to create Heath pottery. The firm’s tableware and architectural tiles were prized by generations of Californians and had been championed by
Frank Lloyd Wright and Eero Saarinen. But by the
turn of the 21st century, the firm was being run by a
family trust (Brian Heath died in 2001, Edith in 2005).
“It was a time capsule. They were still using typewriters,” Petravic says.
Petravic and Bailey did some research and tried
to overcome their hesitation at even asking if they
could take over this venerable pottery line. They did,
and reached an agreement that included keeping all
24 employees. “There was tons and tons of good will.
And we made a really good presentation.”
As new owners, Petravic says, they “asked everyone
to work really hard, and they did.” In December 2008,
Heath branched into Los Angeles, with a second studio/
store. It was rotten in the state of American business—
retail sales down 7 percent nationwide, manufacturing
down 10 percent in 2009—but Heath added 15 employees, tripled the staff ’s profit-sharing, and increased
sales 13 percent, to $7 million. In April, Heath opened
a store in San Francisco’s Ferry Building, nesting place
of the local, sustainable, seasonal food community.
“Earthy looking, but not too earthy, great colors,
local, and not pretentious,” is how an Oakland devotee
FEAT OF CLAY:
The Heath factory
felt like a “ghost
building” to its new
owners, but the firm’s
tableware and tiles
had timeless beauty.
s t a n f o r d 67
NICE TOUCH: Bailey
and Petravic, top, want
to preserve both the
Heath design tradition
and local manufacturing. Lawrence Wing,
a Heath employee for
37 years, works at a
glazing station.
68
describes Heath dinnerware. Notably
persnickety restaurateur Alice Waters
wrote an essay for a 2006 coffee-table
book, Heath Ceramics: The Complexity of
Simplicity. When the Limoges china and
regular restaurant ware at Chez Panisse
were chipping and cracking, Heath “developed a new line of dinnerware that
had just the right weight and durability
and was still elegant. It was the perfect
frame for the restaurant’s food.”
On a tour of the Sausalito factory and
store, employees readily show a visitor
how they work. Clay (most of it from a
pit outside Sacramento) is mixed in two 500-gallon
vats and emerges in doormat-size slabs. Much of the
equipment came from pottery manufacturers that
went out of business elsewhere in America. It is lighter inside than most factories, with workstations set
next to windows.
After clay pieces come out of their molds, they
are hand-finished on potter’s wheels: Edges are
smoothed; cups get handles attached. The pieces are
taken to a warm storage room before getting glazed
and fired in 2,100-degree kilns. At a peephole, the
very close-cropped Petravic warns a visitor, “Be careful. I’ve burned my hair.”
In blue coveralls and a pink bandanna, Winnie
Crittenden tests seasonal glazes and dips with
names like “Petrified Wood.” Crittenden has
worked here 35 years, starting with a summer job while still in high school. Heath’s
workforce, now numbering 85, reflects
California: white, black, Hispanic, Vietnamese and Mien (originally from southwest China). Petravic knows them all—
m a y / j u n e 2 0 1 0
and when we come upon an empty workstation, he
knows why. “We have six people from the same family
working here. They aren’t here today because their
grandma passed away.”
At a tile-pressing machine, three workers move
in concert, as if in a dance. In the tile quality-control
room is a section labeled Overstock and Flawed. “On
the weekends, this room is packed with homeowners
doing bathroom and kitchen remodels. It’s like a tile
potluck. You never know what’s going to be back here.”
Born in England, Petravic grew up in New Jersey.
He discovered design during his senior year at Tufts.
After graduation he took a temp job in an investment bank while he built furniture for a portfolio to
apply to design school. Accepted at several, he had
trouble deciding. “Sometimes people just like to
come to California,” Stanford design professor Matt
Kahn told him, presciently.
Petravic’s joy was in learning the steps to build a
product. His courses led to some nice toothbrush
holders and a table lamp that turned on without a
switch. In business classes, he learned the importance
of finding the right people to ask for advice. One was
Dave Beach, professor of engineering. “Most manufacturing takes irreplaceable resources and converts
them to landfill,” Beach says. “Robin takes Sierra foothills clay and the genius of Edith Heath, finds a balance between industrial activity and aesthetics, and is
respectful of the community. The workforce has every
right to be very proud of what they do.”
“We make a plate—a simple thing, done well,”
Petravic says. A $30 dinner plate lasts, and becomes
a family heirloom.
What next? “We’ll be reaching capacity of the
factory,” Petravic says. “We may take this model (local,
sustainable, balanced between hand-crafted and
industrial) to other products. We believe in the craft
of manufacturing, the close bond between design
and manufacturing.”
He thinks for a second and adds, “Right now
there are no flatware manufacturers in the U.S.” ■
S HEILA H IMMEL , a former restaurant critic for the San
Jose Mercury News, is co-author of a memoir, Hungry.
froM ToP: Jeffery Cross; CoUrTesy HeaTH CeraMICs; reNee ZeLLWeGer
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