Sally O’Callaghan and Jackie Reed add wood to a fire on the beach at Fay Bainbridge Park Saturday while Shannon Buxton and Kathy Mitchell (center) watch.

The artists from the Bainbridge Island Metropolitan Park & Recreation District’s Eagledale Pottery Studio were using the fire for pit-fired pottery. At the bottom of a 2-foot-deep hole in the sand, they placed unfired pieces of pottery, then surrounded the pottery with wood and assorted items that would leave unique markings (hopefully) on the pots, including seaweed, cornhusks, coffee grounds, bay leaves, avocado peels and pits, banana peels, egg shells, copper wire and steel wool.

Buxton said it was the second year in a row the pottery students had gotten permission to do their pit firing at Fay Bainbridge, and the group was expecting to pull their pottery pieces out of the fire by 4 p.m., with high tide coming in a bit later to reclaim the hole in the sand.

(Brian Kelly | Bainbridge Island Review)