Sitting outside her tree-ringed home pottery studio in Santa Rosa, Hannah Allen recalls the exact moment the life she’s now made for herself began to take shape. The Sonoma County native and owner of Olivet Ceramics was tending bar at State Bird Provisions in San Francisco when a customer off-handedly mentioned Heath Ceramics, the esteemed tableware maker founded in Sausalito nearly 80 years ago.
“She was like, ‘I’m the plateware representative. I fly around and talk to chefs about their plateware needs.’ I was like, ‘That’s a job? Oh my God,’” says Allen, who is clad in the clay-stained Carhartt overalls she typically wears on days spent at her pottery wheel. “So that was the first seed.”
Allen and Healdsburg’s Jee Park both craft ceramic pieces for some of the finest restaurants in Sonoma County and beyond, yet these two artists followed wildly different paths toward taking their place at those acclaimed tables…