In 2018, Gabriel Tetrev opened up a 700-square-foot space on Oak Park Avenue to make and sell his ceramics. But after getting a lot of requests to teach classes, he searched for a location that would allow him to do so.
“When people see a wheel in the window, or you working with clay, they want to do it themselves,” said Tetrev, a 28-year-old who grew up in Oak Park. While some don’t want to spend money on other peoples’ pottery, “an $80 one-time class is actually worth it because you get to make something with your own hands and then get the product of that labor. That’s very appealing to people, and that was more of a business. Not only could I pay my bills and make a living that way, I could also become an employer, which is something I’m incredibly passionate about.”
So Tetrev opened ViaClay at 208 S. Marion St. in 2020. Originally 2,000 square feet, ViaClay doubled in size the following year when its neighbor went out of business. The 4,000-square-foot space hosted ceramics classes for all ages, plus members — a group that has been capped at 40 participants for the last three years.
But after getting a mortgage and equipment loan from Forest Park Bank for 7744 Monroe St. in Forest Park, Tetrev said the first month the space was open in May, it garnered a total 111 members. The new 6,000 square foot studio in Forest Park is solely for those members.
ViaClay in Oak Park will continue offering classes. While the space could only accommodate seven six-week classes before, it will now host 14 weeks of classes.
“We are expanding in both directions. It’s more membership, it’s more classes,” Tetrev said. “We want ViaClay to be a place to practice, so both spaces want to embody that more or less, but in different ways for different customers.”
Members pay $250 a month to have 24/7 access to the Forest Park space and pay for clay as they use it.
“Membership really gives you more space to store your work, and it opens up the options when it comes to exploring different firing cycles and different clays. If you want to make your own glaze, we can help you there,” Tetrev said.
After buying the Monroe Street building for members in September, Tetrev and John Beck, who has helped run the business for the last six years, built custom worktables and shelves.
“They’re a little bit deeper and a little bit taller than you can buy,” Tetrev said of the custom shelves. “We really wanted to provide members with as much volumetric space as possible,” or 70% more than what ViaClay offered at its Oak Park location.
When a member finishes a ceramic piece at one of 17 pottery wheels or by hand-throwing, it goes through an initial bisque firing. The piece comes out porous, Tetrev said, and can be dunked into a bucket of glaze, then fired either in one of two electric kilns or, come next month, a new gas kiln. The gas kiln is about three times the size of either electric kiln and more cost effective, according to Tetrev.
“You can get some really interesting effects because you’re firing with gas. I’ve been waiting six years to install a machine like this, and it’s proved impossible to do in a space that you’re renting,” Tetrev said.
Tetrev said that, from about 1950 to 1990, 7744 Monroe St. housed USA Beverage, which rolled beer off the neighboring CSX rail line and stored it in a walk-in fridge that now houses kilns. Though no trains have run on the rail line in decades, Tetrev said 700 square feet of the building is on top of CSX’s land, so he has a 1,000-year lease with the company.
Tetrev said his new neighbors have been accommodating since the building went from quiet light manufacturing to a clay studio.
“We’ve got a community here for the foreseeable future. I’m very excited to offer things like workshops,” Tetrev said. “I want to do everything that is ceramics, everything that is pottery.”
To learn more about ViaClay classes, sign up for the email mailing list at https://www.viaclay.com/classes.