# Wedging Clay: Ram's Head vs Spiral, and Why Both Beat Kneading URL: https://myclay.online/blog/wedging-clay-properly Published: 2026-02-19 Category: Pottery basics Tags: Pottery basics, Wheel throwing, Technique Reading time: 5 min > Wedge on a porous surface with your body weight, not your arms. Ram's head is easier to learn; spiral is faster once you can do it. Cut and check for air pockets. Wedging does three jobs at once: it drives out air pockets, it evens out moisture through the mass, and it aligns the plate-like clay particles into a spiral that helps the clay rise on the wheel. Kneading bread dough, by contrast, deliberately *folds air in* — which is why bread technique on clay makes things worse. > **From the studio:** For a year I wedged on a bench that was slightly too high, and my wrists complained about it every single session. Dropping the bench by fifteen centimetres so I could lean over it with straight arms fixed the pain completely, and my clay came out better as well, because I could finally use my weight instead of my joints. ## Your surface matters more than your technique Wedge on something porous and unyielding: a plaster bat, a slab of concrete, a hardwood bench, or a canvas-covered board. Plaster and unsealed concrete pull a little water out, which is useful for softening clay. Canvas is kind on your wrists but sheds fibre into the clay over time and holds dry dust — wipe it down wet, never dry-brush it. The surface should be at a height where you can lean over it with straight arms. If you are bending your elbows to press, the bench is too high and your shoulders will be finished in ten minutes. ## Ram's head The easier method to learn, and perfectly adequate for anything under about 2 kg. 1. Place a rough ball on the bench. Both hands on the far side, thumbs on top, fingers wrapped underneath. 2. Rock forward, pressing down and away with the heels of your palms and your body weight. The mass flattens forward into a wedge. 3. Roll it back toward you a quarter turn, lifting the near edge, so the flattened section folds under. 4. Press again in the same spot. Repeat 20–40 times. The characteristic ram's-head shape — two horns and a snout — develops as the outer edges fold in. Keep the mass compact; if it spreads sideways you are pressing outward rather than forward. ## Spiral wedging Faster, handles larger masses, and produces the particle alignment throwers care about. It is harder to learn because the two hands do different things. 1. Left hand cradles and rotates the mass roughly 30° counter-clockwise on each cycle. 2. Right hand presses down and forward with the heel of the palm, always on the *same spot* relative to the mass. 3. Because the mass turns and the press does not, the clay folds into itself in a spiral. A conical shell with a shell-like spiral seam develops on the side. The mistake everyone makes is pressing in a new place each time, which just flattens the clay repeatedly. Pick one spot, keep hitting it, and let the rotation do the folding. ## How to tell when it is done - **Look**: uniform colour, no marbling. Marbling means uneven moisture. - **Feel**: uniform resistance across the mass. Any hard or soft patch means keep going. - **Cut**: slice the ball in half with a wire. The cut face should be featureless — no voids, no streaks, no lighter dry seams. Slam the halves back together and carry on if it is not. Cutting is the only honest test. Do it every few sessions until your hands learn the feel. ## Blending clays Wedging is also how you mix clay bodies or bring [reclaim](/blog/how-to-make-slip-for-pottery) back to a consistent stiffness. Cut a soft block and a stiff block into slices, stack them alternately like a deck of cards, compress the stack, and spiral wedge the result. Twenty rotations turns a striped block into one homogeneous body. To dry over-wet reclaim, spread it 3 cm thick on plaster, wait until the surface stiffens, turn it over, and wedge once it is uniformly throwable. Never add dry powder to wet clay to stiffen it — it never fully hydrates and you will find the lumps later, usually with a rib, halfway up a wall. ## Looking after your body Wedging injures more potters than any other task. Keep the bench low, keep your arms straight, drive from your legs and hips, and stop before your wrists complain. If you have a wrist injury, a slab roller and repeated cut-and-slam (lift the block, cut it, slam the halves together, repeat) removes air and homogenises clay with no wrist load at all. It is slower, and it works. ## Reclaiming and blending on the wedging table Wedging is not only preparation. It is also how clay gets repaired, blended and brought back into use, and these three jobs come up constantly. **Softening stiff clay.** Poke deep holes into the block with a dowel, fill them with water, re-bag it tightly, and leave it for a few days. Then wedge. Adding water to the outside alone gives you a slippery skin over a hard core, which is worse than what you started with. **Stiffening soft clay.** Spread it about 3 cm thick on a plaster bat or a dry wooden board and leave it until the surface firms, turning once. Then wedge. Never add dry powder to wet clay — it never fully hydrates and you will find the lumps later with a rib, halfway up a wall. **Blending two bodies or two moisture levels.** Cut both blocks into slices with a wire, stack the slices alternately like a deck of cards, compress the stack, and spiral wedge the result. Twenty rotations turns a striped block into one uniform body. Cut and check the face each time. A featureless cut is the only proof that any of these worked. ## Where to go next Wedging feeds straight into [centering clay on the wheel](/blog/centering-clay-on-the-wheel) — a badly wedged ball is a fight you cannot win with your arms. If you are wedging reclaim, [how to make slip for pottery](/blog/how-to-make-slip-for-pottery) covers the slaking stage that comes before it. And if your clay is arriving too stiff or too soft in the first place, [choosing a clay body](/blog/stoneware-porcelain-earthenware) is worth ten minutes. ## Frequently asked questions **Do air bubbles really make pots explode in the kiln?** Rarely on their own — trapped water is the usual culprit. Air bubbles cause more trouble on the wheel, where they show up as a soft spot that tears the wall as it thins. **How long should you wedge clay?** 20 to 40 rotations for a fist-sized ball of reasonably fresh clay. Reclaimed clay with uneven moisture may need 60 or more. **Do you need to wedge clay straight out of the bag?** Commercially pugged clay is de-aired, so you can throw it as-is. Wedging it anyway aligns the particles and warms it, which makes it noticeably easier to centre. --- Source: https://myclay.online/blog/wedging-clay-properly — https://myclay.online/