“After 31 years at the wheel, I’m letting the kiln go cold” – Raelene (71) is selling the last of her hand-painted teapots at a special price. The pot that made her name is being retired.

For 31 years, Raelene Pickering has thrown and painted every teapot by hand in her iron shed in Gulgong, New South Wales. Now the last 283 are leaving her shelves – and there will never be another.

Gulgong, late October. The old iron shed behind Raelene’s house, on the edge of town with the Cudgegong River not far off, smells of wet clay, kiln dust and strong tea. Shelves line the corrugated-iron walls, holding teapots at every stage – grey and raw, chalk-white from the first firing, and finished ones glowing with pink roses, red blooms and tiny songbirds. On the bench sit a jar of brushes worn to a point, a sponge, a wire for cutting clay. Raelene pulls her stool up to the wheel the way she has every morning for the last 24 years. But this spring is different. It is her last.

“I’m 71,” she says, and holds up her hands. The knuckles are swollen. “It’s the arthritis. Throwing a pot is all wrists – you have to hold a spinning lump of clay dead centre, and my wrists won’t hold it any more. Some mornings I can’t close my fingers round a brush until the second cuppa.” The house is too big for one person now, too, and her daughter Leanne has a little unit ready for her ten minutes from her own place in Port Macquarie. But that isn’t why she is stopping. “If my hands still worked, I’d take the wheel with me. They don’t.” Then she shakes her head at something else. “Go into any big shop. Every pretty teapot has a sticker where the painting should be. Hardly anyone makes them by hand any more.”

31 years, more than 7,000 teapots – and it all started with one pot for two

Raelene has done the counting. For 28 years she painted roses onto dinner plates at a pottery works over in Mudgee, and in 1995 she started throwing her own pots in the shed in the evenings. When the works closed in 2002, the shed became her workshop for good. The first teapot she ever threw at home was a present for her husband, Barry, on their 19th anniversary in 1995. It leaned a little, and the lid rattled. Barry loved it. Every arvo at four, he put it on the kitchen table and said the same thing: “One pot, two cups. Nobody gets up till it’s empty.” For 26 years, nobody did. Barry passed away in 2021. Raelene still sets out two cups at four. These days the second one belongs to her neighbour Dot, widowed the same winter, who pops over the back fence for it. “A mug is for drinking,” Raelene says. “A pot is for staying.” Friends asked for one like it, then their daughters did, and in 31 years more than 7,000 teapots have left this shed.

What makes Raelene’s teapots so different

It isn’t only the roses – the big pink blooms on the belly, the red flowers running down the spout, the little bluebird perched on the side. It’s how each pot is made: thrown by hand on the wheel, painted by hand, and fired so it lasts a lifetime of afternoons.

Raelene paints her roses straight onto the bare clay. Then a clear glaze goes over the top, and pot, paint and glaze are fired together in the kiln. The painting ends up sealed beneath a layer of glass – it can’t peel, it can’t scratch off, and it won’t fade in the washing-up. The walls are thrown thicker than a factory pot, so they hold the heat: the second and third cups pour nearly as hot as the first. The spout is pulled by hand and cut at a sharp angle, so it pours clean and stops clean, with no dribble down the side. And the tall gold-tone handle arches high above the lid, out of the steam, so the pot can be lifted and passed across the table. It stands 17 centimetres tall and 13 centimetres across the base, and holds about four good cups – enough for two people and a long yarn.

The result is a teapot that does more than pour tea. It sets a table. It gives people a reason to sit back down.

“Some of my customers have poured from the same pot for twenty years”

Raelene reaches up to a shelf above the wheel for a dented old biscuit tin. There are no biscuits in it – only cards and letters, packed edge to edge. “Thank-you notes. Some of these ladies have written every Christmas for twenty years,” she says. She pulls out one dated 2004: “Dear Raelene, we have used your teapot every single day since our wedding. It has been washed more times than I can count, and the roses look exactly like the day you painted them.”

The reason is patience. A factory prints a sheet of roses onto thousands of pots a day. Raelene makes one at a time. A single teapot takes most of a week from wet clay to finished piece: throwing, trimming, pulling the spout, drying, a first firing, painting every flower, glazing, and the final firing.

The end of an era – and one last chance

On 30 November, Raelene will fire the kiln for the last time. “There’s no one to take it over. Nobody wants to learn this any more – it takes years before the clay starts listening to you.” 283 teapots are left on her shelves and in the drying room. The last pots her hands will ever make.

To be sure they end up on good tables, she has made a decision her family didn’t expect: a clear special price on every one. “I don’t need the money. I want these pots on kitchen tables where people actually sit down together – with people who understand what goes into one,” Raelene says. “My grandkids Kiara (24) and Brodie (27) are selling them online for me. I wouldn’t have a clue where to start with all that computer business,” she adds with a laugh.

It was Brodie who gave the pot its name. “He grew up at that table at four o’clock with his pop,” Raelene says. “He said there was only one thing to call it.” The Four O’Clock Pot stuck. And for a lot of her customers, a simple teapot has turned into a daily ritual: put the kettle on, set out two cups, and ring someone to come over.

Why Raelene’s teapots stand apart:

• Thrown on Raelene’s own wheel: Every pot is shaped, trimmed and finished one at a time in her Gulgong shed – no moulds, no conveyor belt.
• Painted by hand, sealed under the glaze: The roses are fired in beneath a layer of clear glaze, so they never peel, scratch off or fade.
• Keeps the tea hot: The thick hand-thrown walls hold the heat, so the second and third cups are as good as the first.
• A clean, drip-free pour: The hand-pulled spout is cut at a sharp angle – no tea running down the side, no rings on the tablecloth.
• A handle that stays out of the steam: The tall gold-tone arch rides high above the lid, so the pot lifts and passes easily across the table.
• Limited: Only 283 teapots left from Raelene’s final firing – when they’re gone, there will be no more.

What customers say about Raelene’s teapots

• ★★★★★

  “I didn’t think a teapot could change my afternoons. I make a pot at three now, sit out on the verandah and actually slow down for once. The roses are even prettier in person – you can see the little brushstrokes.”

  – Kerry R., 63, Mudgee
• ★★★★★

  “I’ve had cheap printed teapots where the pattern wore off inside a year. This one gets washed every day and still looks brand new. You can tell the difference the moment you pick it up.”

  – Debra J., 58, Orange
• ★★★★★

  “My husband and I started having a pot after tea instead of putting the telly on. Four cups is just right for the two of us, and it stays hot the whole time we talk.”

  – Lorraine W., 67, Toowoomba
• ★★★★★

  “I bought it for myself after Mum passed – she always had a pot going. Now my granddaughter asks for ‘tea at Nan’s’ every Sunday. That’s exactly what I hoped for.”

  – Tania S., 54, Wagga Wagga

“The present that gets the family back round the table”

Her customer Michelle D. (49) from Dubbo puts it best: “I gave Mum one of Raelene’s teapots for her birthday last month. She’s been on her own since Dad died, and she held it like it was something precious – because it is. Now every Sunday she rings and says, ‘The pot’s on, are you coming?’ We haven’t missed a Sunday since.”

Where can you get Raelene’s teapots?

Raelene’s teapots are only available through Backroad Goods – an online shop that specialises in real handwork from selected makers. Her grandkids Kiara and Brodie run Raelene’s own little corner of the shop there. Only there will you get the original teapots from her shed. Look-alike teapots have started turning up on Amazon and Temu. At first glance they seem similar, but the roses are a printed transfer stuck onto the surface – and they tend to fade, scratch and chip within months. They have nothing to do with Raelene’s work.

Only until 30 November – then the kiln goes cold

Raelene plans to fire her last kiln load at the end of November. “I’d like every one of these pots on somebody’s table by Christmas. After that, that’s it,” she says quietly. Then she smiles. “Thirty-one years. It’s been a good run.”

Kiara and Brodie will keep sending out the finished pots after 30 November, as long as any are left on the shelves. But with the special price and this much demand, the last 283 are not expected to last long.

It is the last chance to bring a piece of real Australian handwork to your table – before Raelene’s roses are gone for good.

The verdict

The Four O’Clock Pot is the teapot people fall for at first sight. It is thrown and painted by hand in Raelene’s shed, and it brings something back to the kitchen table that a mug never could – a reason to pour a second cup and stay a little longer.

A piece with real heart: beautifully painted, built to last, and thought through down to the spout. Every afternoon it gets set out is a small, warm moment worth having. Thank you, Raelene!

Readers keep sending us photos of their Four O’Clock Pot

• ★★★★★

  “It breaks my heart that makers like Raelene are the last of their kind. I ordered two straight away – one for our kitchen and one for my sister in Perth. Now we text each other a photo of our four o’clock pot every day.”

  – The Hargreaves family, Bathurst
• ★★★★★

  “Heavier and better made than I expected, and the little bird on the side is my favourite detail. It keeps the tea hot through a whole episode of my show.”

  – Julie T., Ballarat
• ★★★★★

  “It lives in the middle of our table now. The grandkids argue over who gets to pour, and nobody leaves until it’s empty – just like the story says.”

  – Sandra N., Newcastle
• ★★★★★

  “Absolutely beautiful. Every visitor asks where it’s from, and I get to tell them about Raelene. That alone was worth it.”

  – Christine K., Launceston
• ★★★★★

  “Bought one for my aunty’s 80th. She’s collected teapots all her life and reckons this is the prettiest she’s ever owned. She has her friends over every Thursday now just to use it.”

  – Megan R., Bendigo