A range of talents and know-how, in the land of Dieulefit: 40 potters’ and ceramists’ workshops that you can admire all year round! Classified as a “City of Art and Crafts”, Dieulefit concentrates workshops, boutiques, museums and galleries in the main street of its city centre.
Known for its pottery and its picodon, a small goat cheese from here, Dieulefit is located on the banks of the Jabron River, in a green hilly setting. The facades of the houses, facing the river, have been repainted in pastel tones. Other facades, which we discover while strolling around in the old Dieulefit, attract our attention… An original talent that is also expressed on the walls, no doubt: we are in a city of artists !
Potters and ceramists use various techniques and each has his specialty : from decorative and artistic creation, or more functional like the arts of the table, where mass production is combined with the creation of unique pieces ! Visit the workshops, galleries or shops where pottery and ceramics as well as paintings and sculptures are exhibited.
Pottery of Dieulefit : its history
The history of Dieulefit pottery goes back 2000 years. Archaeological excavations have revealed remains of ovens and pottery from the Gallic-Roman period. The pottery activity developed in Dieulefit because the territory has clay quarries. They are reputed for their qualities of refractory earth, “fire earth” (resistant to thermal shock).
For the benefit of the Rhône and local clay, an essential raw material for the production of ceramics, the pottery production activity reached its peak at 19ème century and about 100 workshops have settled in the Jabron valley.
Today, the Dieulefit area perpetuates this tradition with a renewal of production through more contemporary creations:
From culinary to utility and from utility to decorative, ceramics has evolved according to the needs and desires of customers, as well as current trends. Several centres and workshops are invested in the enhancement of this heritage and in the promotion of contemporary ceramic activity.
©Lionel Pascale
House of Ceramics: between museum and gallery
La Ceramic house, created in 1995, is a specialized cultural centre. Its vocation is to highlight the local heritage inherited from a pottery tradition that is still alive through:
- A space for presenting local pottery history: accessible to all, far from the chronological approach, it highlights the ancestral know-how of the local ceramists.
- A temporary exhibition space dedicated to contemporary ceramic creation
- An offer of leisure activities in regular classes, weekends and weekly workshops – with family, for children, for adults – and around different techniques – modelling, shooting, set design
- A shop space
During the visit, more than 200 pieces illustrate in a chronological way the pottery history of the country of Dieulefit where you can follow different stages: the evolution of the productions in particular, the great era of Dieulefit to 19ème siècle qui présente les poteries culinaires.
Label: 100% Dieulefit guarantee
Potters and ceramists have committed themselves to sign a charter guaranteeing the authenticity and quality of their manufacture under the label “DIEULEFIT ORIGINAL“.
This mark is granted to any ceramic article for domestic, ornamental, artistic, serial or single use. It guarantees that the part is designed, made, shaped, enamelled, fired, decorated… at 100% in the workshops du Pays de Dieulefit.
La Drôme Provençale, because of its pages varied and their palette de couleurs, is a territory conducive to creation, source of inspiration for many craftsmen, painters and other artists who will certainly welcome you to their workshops and exhibition spaces to share their passion with you.