The Maverick Potter

06/05/2026

Wanted: your clean newspapers ready for recycling!
Since The Mountain Mail is no longer printing in town, we lost our supply of local paper for wrapping our wares for customers. We would rather re-use and recycle what is already here rather than pay to have paper shipped in. So if you get the paper, please consider bringing it to the Maverick Potter instead of putting it in the recycling bin.
We are always happy to take your small bubble wrap too (not the pillows).
Thanks a bunch! Call the shoppe 719-539-5112 or email [email protected] if you have any questions.
We are open 10-6 every day but Sunday, that's 11-4.

06/05/2026

Come enjoy the evening!
We love our downtown galleries!

Come on down for another festive First Friday DOWN BY THE RIVER June 5 from 5pm to 7pm in the Salida Creative District.

Enjoy an evening downtown with Salida's creative community as businesses stay open later. Visit studios and galleries, talk with an artist, see new work, watch a demo and enjoy live music and refreshments.

Stop in at the host gallery Patti Vincent Studio & Gallery with live music by Bobby Gulley! Enjoy events at participating businesses Salida Mercantile, Arts Collective Salida, Sage Mountain Gallery, The Maverick Potter, Well Rooted, Eye Candy ~ Art and Treasure, Four Winds Gallery.Salida.CO, Kaleidoscope Toys, Dreamer, Leslie Jorgensen, BrodeurArt, The Book Club Salida, Wendy Mitchell Art at Salida Ceramics - Community Clay Studio Warehouse Studios, Riveting Experience, Opal Boutique Salida and live music by Sevun Star at Tres Litros Beer Company and more!

🎨Chalk art by Curtis Killorn, Salida Chalk Festival 2024

05/30/2026

LAST CHANCE to sign up for our wheel class that starts Monday!

05/23/2026

Sound on! Clay slop

05/23/2026

New work dropped at the shoppe by Greg Maxwell, new color palette and columbine embellishment. Picked up new work from Red Hawk pottery in Grand Junction on my way back from seeing BTS in California. New form for the mountain theme, handy thumb cups!

05/01/2026

Today is a big day! It's the 18th Anniversary of The Maverick Potter. We started our shop in the midst of the financial crisis of 2008. Perhaps our timing could have been better, but starting a pottery gallery had been a life goal since earning a Fine Arts degree in Ceramics in 1991 from Lewis and Clark College. Initially, post college, I made pottery while supporting myself working for a number of different breweries and brew pubs. This turned into a 15 year career in the beer business which helped set the stage to make the transition to potter and to Salida. It was a big jump, a jump of faith. But sometimes life gives you opportunities that you have to go for.
Salida came on my radar in the late 90's after having spent time here on a number of ocassions with Ride the Rockies and with New Belgium working as an eventer. On one occasion I happened across Potter Bob and his shop on 1st street. Some of you old timers may remember him and Liz. They had a shop where they sold work in front and created in back. This planted the seed. I was hooked and so the quest to find a way to move here and start my pottery began.
We found our home in 2007 on a whim, after my wife's South High School reunion. She saw a posting for a house the gave us room to have kiln and produce pottery. It was meant to be a second home that we would move into later. But as fate would have it on our first trip out to do some renovations on the house I came across the perfect gallery space.
And so here we are 18 years later.
Peace and blessings to all of you and thank you for supporting us over the years!
Pics from the kiln unloading this morning!

05/01/2026

Sneak peek for First Friday Fresh kiln load!
We will have bunches of bowls and tumblers to celebrate our 18th birthday! Live music and sweet treats!

05/01/2026

It's our 18th Anniversary, come celebrate with us!

⚱️Stop by host gallery The Maverick Potter during First Friday. Talk with the artist and enjoy live music by Hemmed-in-Hollow. May 1, 5-7pm.

04/24/2026

Excited to share this post about the MUSEUM OF AUTHENTICITY!

On 1 May 2026 Friday, the MUSEUM OF AUTHENTICITY will host CREATIVITY UNLIMITED, an event designed to acknowledge the value of creative self-expression and to celebrate the role the arts play in social change.

1-2:00 pm: museum tour: MUSEUM OF AUTHENTICITY founding director Thordis Niela Simonsen will introduce you to MoA’s new wing that opened in October, 2025.

2-3:00 pm: presentation: licensed clinical psychologist and diplomate Jungian analyst MARK PALMER will discuss his understanding of the psychology of creativity. His goal is to evoke “a respectful awe for one of the great mysteries of human life—the creative experience.”

3:30-4:30 pm: gallery talk: THORDIS NIELA SIMONSEN, artist and MoA docent, began painting in a Jungian art therapy group. Referring to works by her in MoA’s current exhibit, INSIGHT, Thordis will discuss her painting process and experience.

5:30-6:30 pm: music: AUBREA ALFORD, Salida’s extraordinary genre-bending, classically trained violinist and recording artist, playing accoustic violin, will improvise in response to paintings in MoA’s current exhibit, INSIGHT.

04/22/2026

Here are some examples of dinner sets that I do. The green and blue and red and blue I have enjoyed making for many years. I now have sets from my high fire kiln. The blue and the speckled white.