Associate Professor Rebecca Nunes wins an AHRC Curiosity Fund bid for research into ball clay and its connections between Stoke-on-Trent and South Devon.

In Devon, several millennia ago, a specific set of geological conditions coalesced to create ball clay, a rare clay possessing qualities that enabled an explosion in ceramics production in the Potteries of Staffordshire.

Associate Professor Becky Nunes and Sophy Rickett, Reader and Senior Lecturer in Photography at LCC, will use this funding to explore the key connections in community histories and narratives surrounding the clay ball and the industries it facilitated in both Stoke-on-Trent and South Devon. The funding will enable exploration of archival material and consultation with those communities whose lives have been shaped, directly or indirectly, by the clay.