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Common and appealing shapes for bowls and platters and their history & use cases?

Jon Rista

Jon Rista

Joined
Jul 30, 2021
Messages
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Location
Aurora, CO
I've been turning bowls and platters lately, after not having turned many for a couple of years. I have noticed that I tend towards turning them with certain shapes, and a rather limited range of varieties. I probably turn bowls in maybe 3 or 4 shapes most of the time, platters in just one or two, mostly. I have turned a fair amount of vases over the last year, and I've spent time experimenting with shapes that I hadn't tried before. This all had me wondering, what are the common shapes for bowls and platters, and what do turners and potential buyers find most appealing for bowl and platter shapes?

I did a little bit of searching, and I found some images of various shapes, although very small (almost icon sized), and sadly, all the names were in chinese. A am curious if there are common names for a lot of the various designs? I imagine that certain designs historically, were used for certain use cases, and I am curious I guess, to learn more about the history of bowl and platter shapes, their names, their use cases, etc.

Maybe this is more of an off topic discussion...not really sure where to put it though, if it doesn't belong here.
 
Here's an old post of mine with pictures of a Platter from late 1700's.
Sam Fleisher

Post in thread 'Guess they do still make them like they used to.'

And I guess even then they made them so you couldn't see how they were mounted.

You can see the tool marks so obviously something spun it around. Pole lathe back then?

I don't know if that would have been considered "fine" dining ware of the time but the repair certainly is primitive. So I don't feel bad about some of the questionable looking repairs I do.

Makes a person wonder if anything I make will be around in a couple of hundred years and will my repairs have held? (probably not)

Although whoever made that probably thought the same way and would be shocked at the value now.
 
For bowls, at least, I strongly recommend you get a copy of Richard Raffan's The Art of Turned Bowls. Chapter 3 is on Form, and he discusses and has diagrams of dozens of shapes, and shows how the shape of the bowl leads to function and an attractive form.

For history, you can't beat Robin Wood's The Wooden Bowl.
 
Jon Rista said:
...what are the common shapes for bowls and platters, and what do turners and potential buyers find most appealing for bowl and platter shapes?
Click to expand...

I think this topic is wide open to personal preference and opinion. And with any art, preferences morph over time with seeing, feeling, discussion, experience, creativity, experimentation, growth, and more. Celebrate variety. My lifelong mantra: If we all liked the same thing, wouldn't life be boring.

My personal drive: Never quit looking at things, important even to discover what I DON'T like. Although life is short, I never pass up the opportunity for immersion in museums and art galleries. I've spent so much time in such places in the US, UK, and Europe. Pay attention to architecture.
Forums like this are invaluable. The incredible ease today to view and save digital images gives us amazing advantage.

I hope to NEVER quit making things, including sketches of ideas. I sometimes fill pages with sketches before I put wood on the lathe. Then I might make and refine prototypes.


JKJ
 
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Karl Best said:
For bowls, at least, I strongly recommend you get a copy of Richard Raffan's The Art of Turned Bowls. Chapter 3 is on Form, and he discusses and has diagrams of dozens of shapes, and shows how the shape of the bowl leads to function and an attractive form.

For history, you can't beat Robin Wood's The Wooden Bowl.
Click to expand...
Steve Tiedman said:
Books-
Woodturning- A Source Book of Shapes, John Hunnex

The Art of Turned Bowls, Richard Raffan

Video giving a quick explanation of the Fibinacci (Golden) Ratio. Research how to apply it to woodturning. Or similarly to pottery.
View: https://youtu.be/FrK88nhW8Ko?si=X5QqkctPASbh6KbA
Click to expand...

Ah, thank you so much! The book reqs are great. Looks like I need to get Richard Raffan's "The Art of Turned Bowles" given two people recommended it right off the bat.

I am quite familiar with the Golden Ratio and Fibonacci Spiral from photography. I hadn't thought of applying it to woodworking, but it makes sense.
 
Brian Gustin said:
A lot of turners pattern their bowl shapes based on Pottery styles...
Click to expand...

Ah, pottery styles! To be honest, that is actually kind of what I was thinking when considering this earlier. I don't know why I didn't search for pottery styles first! I have been watching a ton of videos of chinese artisans who replicate and do ancient chinese crafts. A lot of it is pottery, which was also kind of what made me ponder this and post the thread.
 
Sam Fleisher said:
Here's an old post of mine with pictures of a Platter from late 1700's.
Sam Fleisher

Post in thread 'Guess they do still make them like they used to.'

And I guess even then they made them so you couldn't see how they were mounted.

You can see the tool marks so obviously something spun it around. Pole lathe back then?

I don't know if that would have been considered "fine" dining ware of the time but the repair certainly is primitive. So I don't feel bad about some of the questionable looking repairs I do.

Makes a person wonder if anything I make will be around in a couple of hundred years and will my repairs have held? (probably not)

Although whoever made that probably thought the same way and would be shocked at the value now.
Click to expand...

Phew! Hundreds of years! I kind of wonder if anything I make would last even a hundred. That said, I started a number of threads on finishes recently, and some of teh responses were quite intriguing. I have also been following a number of people's posts on how they finish their works. I wonder, if some of our modern finishes, are just as durable as those from the past. The recent talk about 1:1:1 blends of an oil, a varnish and a solvent, and the application methods that really get the finish into the fibers and really polish it in and on... I guess if you put the effort in, I think it could help a modern turned item last for an age.
 
John K Jordan said:
I think this topic is wide open to personal preference and opinion. And with any art, preferences morph over time with seeing, feeling, discussion, experience, creativity, experimentation, growth, and more. Celebrate variety. My lifelong mantra: If we all liked the same thing, wouldn't life be boring.

My personal drive: Never quit looking at things, important even to discover what I DON'T like. Although life is short, I never pass up the opportunity for immersion in museums and art galleries. I've spent so much time in such places in the US, UK, and Europe. Pay attention to architecture.
Forums like this are invaluable. The incredible ease today to view and save digital images gives us amazing advantage.

I hope to NEVER quit making things, including sketches of ideas. I sometimes fill pages with sketches before I put wood on the lathe. Then I might make and refine prototypes.


JKJ
Click to expand...

Thanks John!

Your point about sketching, is really good. I have done a little bit of that on and off over the last 8 months or so. I think I really need to start doing that more consistently. Even if I don't turn things, or not right away, I think its a really good idea to have the ideas jotted down and sketched out, as you never know if you might want to return to them in the future.

I have had a lot of great ideas for custom pens and pen blanks over the last few years. I ran into problems with my health (my sleep, really), and a lot of those ideas just kind of fell off...and were never realized. The sad thing is, I can't remember all of them, and if I had been sketching them and describing the details, I could have returned to them...say now!

Also a good point about discovering what you don't like. Also kind of creates a bit of a conundrum, when selling your wares is part of the goal. Do you make things, that you yourself don't like, if someone else might? Or do you just skip past any design you don't like and just make what you do? I wonder also, if a design might suffer in implementation, if you really don't like it!
 
Jon Rista said:
That is really beautiful. I am also honestly curious: HOW did you make that? On a lathe, or was it carved or machined some how?
Click to expand...
I made it on my elliptical machine, which works on similar principles as many ornamental lathes just on a bigger scale and vertically. Here's a video link:
View: https://youtu.be/cptIwzHFiKc?si=byTv_k0dVYdyLPwC

Other videos and shorts are on my channel as well, including several showing the making of the elliptical bowl in my avatar.

Tim
 
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