Who started National Clay Day?

Other clay observances do have founders, including two ceramic artists who started National Clay Week. National Clay Day is not one of them, and no founder, organiser, or establishing record has been located for it.

Do ceramic artists have their own clay day?

They do, though it is not this one. NCECA and the 92nd Street Y ran the first Global Day of Clay on November 8, 2017.

National Clay Day

Next celebratedSunday, July 25, 2027

A day for putting hands in clay, a material the United States mines by the millions of tons and sends into far more brick and cement than pottery.

See how to celebrate

Countdown to the day

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Last updated September 1, 2026 · by the Holiday Calendar TeamHave an update or spot an error?

YEARLY DATEJuly 25

OBSERVED INInternationally

CATEGORYHobbies

SUBCATEGORYArts & Crafts

ORIGIN

Community Origin

FOUNDING ENTITY

Not documented

FIRST OBSERVED

Not documented

HOW THE HOLIDAY CAME TO BE

An observance without an author.

National Clay Day circulates as a July 25 observance marked by individual pottery studios and educational channels rather than by any organising body. No founder or establishing record has been identified.

+ Know the story? Submit a founder Help us complete this holiday

INTRO

Ten dollars a pound for a day nobody founded

On July 25, 2024, a pottery studio in Morgantown, West Virginia, dropped the price of clay from $15 a pound to $10. The sale ran until eight in the evening. The occasion was National Clay Day, and nobody knows who started it.

Four holiday-listing sites publish a dated roundup for July 25, and not one of them includes the day. The earliest known listing was archived in December 2022, and the site that ran it has since taken the page down.

That leaves the day to the people who actually work the material. They marked it anyway.

ORIGINS

Clay Day history

INTRODUCTION

In December 2012, a gallery owner in Pittsburg, Kansas, sat down and started writing. She was, in her own words, "sitting here in my gallery with nothing much to do". What she proposed was a National Day of Clay.

Her plan was specific. Potters across the country would open their studios on one date, and a website would let a visitor "type in your zip code" and find the ones nearby. Eleven people joined the thread across six days, and nothing was built.

CHAPTER 01

The days the clay world did build

Three years later two ceramic artists began building a clay observance of their own. National Clay Week began as an idea in 2015 between Stephen Creech and Lindsay Oesterritter. Its first run came the following year, organised around five topics, one for each day.

Larger institutions followed. On November 8, 2017, NCECA and the 92nd Street Y ran the first Global Day of Clay, which drew 273 images tagged on Instagram.

Both had organisers willing to be named. National Clay Week went further and posted its own dates on its own website.

CHAPTER 02

A July date with no author

None of that produced July 25. The observances with a documented start can point to the people who started them. National Clay Day cannot.

The record is not thin. It is empty. A search of the Federal Register returns no document under the name, and no organisation has been found claiming it.

What the day has instead is use. An educational channel published a six-minute episode for it on July 25, 2023. The day persists because people keep marking it, which is a different thing from being founded.

WHY THIS DAY MATTERS

Why We Love National Clay Day

ANTIQUITY

Pottery arrived ten millennia or more before farming did.

Radiocarbon dating at Xianrendong Cave in China placed the contexts of the earliest pottery sherds at 20,000 to 19,000 calendar years old. The researchers concluded that pottery was first made and used ten millennia or more before agriculture emerged.

INFRASTRUCTURE

Most clay ends up inside buildings

The United States Geological Survey estimates that 43% of American common clay goes into brick. Lightweight aggregate and cement absorb most of what is left.

HOUSEHOLD

Most American bentonite becomes pet waste absorbent

Nearly half of American bentonite, 48%, is sold as pet waste absorbent. Drilling mud accounts for another 22%.

BY THE NUMBERS

National Clay Day by the Numbers

26M tons: US clay mined, 2025 est.
$1.8B: Value of US clay mined, 2025 est.
38: US states with clay mines
2.4M tons: US fuller's earth output, 2025 est.

TIMELINE

Timeline

Potters propose a day

A gallery owner in Pittsburg, Kansas, posted a plan for a National Day of Clay to a ceramics forum.

National Clay Week takes shape

Ceramic artists Stephen Creech and Lindsay Oesterritter began developing a week-long clay observance.

First National Clay Week

The opening edition ran with five topics, one assigned to each day of the week.

First Global Day of Clay

NCECA and the 92nd Street Y ran the inaugural event on November 8.

Clay Week keeps its autumn slot

National Clay Week listed its dates that year as October 7 to 13 on its own website.

An education channel marks the day

A daily-observance channel published a six-minute National Clay Day episode on July 25.

MYTH VS FACT

Common Misconceptions

The myth

National Clay Day has been observed every year since 1950.

The truth

No source supports a 1950 start. Organised observances for clay are recent inventions, and this one has no documented founding at all.

The myth

National Clay Day is another name for National Clay Week.

The truth

They are separate observances. National Clay Week is a week-long ceramics event that ran in autumn rather than in July.

GET INVOLVED

How to Celebrate National Clay Day

Book a wheel session at a local studio

Search for a community studio near you and ask what one session on the wheel costs. Call before you go rather than turning up.

BUY

Buy clay by the pound and build by hand

Clay is sold by the pound and needs no wheel to shape by hand. Ask a local studio what it charges to fire a piece once you have made it.

FIND

Find out what your own walls are made of

Look up when your building went up and what it was built from. County property records and local historical societies are the usual starting points.

READ

Read the study that dated the oldest known pottery

The abstract of the 2012 Xianrendong paper is free to read online. It sets out how the sherds were dated and why the result mattered.

COMPARE

Compare where each grade of clay ends up

Just over half of American kaolin, 56%, becomes filler, extender and binder, while only 20% goes into ceramics. The United States Geological Survey publishes the split for every grade it tracks.

Test your knowledge

How well do you know National Clay Day?

1 / 7

In which month did National Clay Week actually take place?

Answer

No. It is an unofficial observance with no legal standing anywhere that could be found, so schools, banks, and offices stay open.

COLOPHON

Sources

How we know what’s on this page. References, not endorsements.

9sources

9primary records

8independently dated

U.S. Geological Survey2026-02

Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026: Clays

Annual figures on American clay tonnage, value, prices and end uses.

View source

Science2012

Early pottery at 20,000 years ago in Xianrendong Cave, China

Radiocarbon study dating the oldest known pottery sherds in China.

View source

Ceramic Arts Daily Community2012-12

National Day Of Clay

A 2012 forum thread where potters proposed a nationwide open-studio day.

View source

NCECA2017-11

Global Day of Clay in review

The organisers' own tally of the first Global Day of Clay.

View source

National Clay Week2019

A Celebration of Clay in all its forms

The observance's own site, listing its October 2019 dates.

View source

The Wow! Factory2024-07

National Clay Day!

A Morgantown studio's July 25, 2024 clay sale and open hours.

View source

National Day with Mrs E2023-07

National Clay Day! July 25th 2023

A daily-observance channel's July 25, 2023 episode on the day.

View source

Federal Register

Federal Register document search API

The US government's searchable index of proclamations and agency documents.

View source

Ceramics Monthly2018-11

Clay Culture: National Clay Week

An organiser's account of how National Clay Week was founded and run.

View source

Related holidays

National Clay Week

Get your hands dirty and unleash your creativity - it's National Clay Week! Join in on workshops, exhibits, and events celebrating this versatile art form.

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TUE

Aug 2026