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# Inside Gladstone Pottery Museum – The Home of The Great Pottery Throw Down
- URL: https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/inside-gladstone-pottery-museum-the-home-of-the-great-pottery-throw-down/
- Published: 2026-09-27T18:01:57.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-27T18:01:57.000Z
- Description: Gladstone Pottery Museum is somewhere we have visited before. Set inside a former Victorian pottery factory in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, it gives you the chance to see how the pottery industry that made this area famous actually worked. The Great Pottery Throw Down, is also filmed here.
- Author: Sue
- Tags: Accessible Attractions, Blue Badge Parking & Drop-Off, Carer Tickets & Disabled Admission, Free & Low-Cost Days Out, Museums & Galleries, Neurodiverse Activities, Staffordshire & Stoke-on-Trent, Visually Impaired Experiences

Gladstone Pottery Museum is somewhere we have visited before, but it had been quite a while, so we decided it was time for a return visit.

Set inside a former Victorian pottery factory in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, Gladstone gives you the chance to see how the pottery industry that made this area famous actually worked. It is also now very familiar to fans of *The Great Pottery Throw Down*, which is filmed here.

In fact, filming affected our visit before we'd even arrived. At the time of writing, the museum has limited opening days while *The Great Pottery Throw Down* is being filmed, so **don't assume it will be open before setting off**. Check the museum's website for the current opening days and times.

💡

****Essential access info (as of September 2026)**  
  
****Prices:** We paid £14.80 in total for three (two concession admissions plus one carer admitted free).  
****Carer ticket:** The accompanying carer was admitted free while the two disabled visitors paid the concession rate.  
****Parking:** Limited Blue Badge parking — around four spaces from memory, so do not rely on finding a large accessible car park.  
****Mobility:** A Victorian pottery factory with a cobbled main courtyard. A signposted accessible ramp and push-button door lead into the main entrance. The lift serving the Flushed with Pride exhibition was out of order on our visit, so we used the stairs instead.  
****Visual impairment:** Demonstrators took time to explain what they were doing and let John, who is totally blind, explore hands-on — for example touching a potter’s wheel and unfired china-flower material — rather than relying only on a visual demonstration.  
  
**Prices and policies as we found them on our visit — always check with the venue before you go.*

## Arriving at Gladstone Pottery Museum

There is limited Blue Badge parking at the museum. From memory, there were around four spaces, so this isn't somewhere I would rely on finding a large accessible car park.

Once inside the site, one of the first things to bear in mind is that this is a genuine Victorian pottery factory rather than a modern purpose-built museum. The central courtyard is cobbled, and that inevitably has implications for anyone using a wheelchair, mobility aid or, as in John's case, a white cane.

We did find an accessible route into the museum. As we approached the main entrance, signs directed us towards an access ramp and there was a push-button door.

![A collection of artefacts from the museum are on the left. In front there are buildings and a sign pointing out where the main entrance is, and the ramped entrance via the shop](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/entrance-1.jpg)

The entrance with the ramp clearly signposted

### Admission

We paid **£14.80 in total** for the three of us. John and George were both charged the concession admission price because of their disabilities, while I was admitted free as a carer.

**Check the** [**Gladstone Pottery Museum**](https://www.stokemuseums.org.uk/gpm/visit/?ref=specialneedsadventurefamily.com) **website before visiting for current admission charges as well as current opening arrangements.**

## Following in the footsteps of The Great Pottery Throw Down

Just beyond reception is a passageway that has a particularly familiar appearance if you watch *The Great Pottery Throw Down*.

This was traditionally the route through which workers, materials and finished pottery entered and left the factory. Today, it is also the route used by the potters on the programme.

The adjoining Lodge gives a glimpse of the much less glamorous reality of working here. Workers had to clock in for a 7.30am start. Ten minutes later, the gates were shut and anyone arriving after that couldn't clock in until 9.30am – losing two hours' work.

![Wooden Victorian clocking-on machine beside iron gates in the entrance passage at Gladstone Pottery Museum.](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/clocking-on.jpg)

The old clocking-on machine beside the passage and gates used by the potters on **The Great Pottery Throw Down*.

## Into the Victorian pottery

Once out in the main courtyard, you begin to appreciate the scale of the site. The bottle ovens dominate the old factory, with the different workshops arranged around the courtyard.

We visited the Engine House, where the steam engine once powered machinery around the pottery through shafts and belts, before moving on to learn about saggars – the fire-resistant containers that protected pottery from flames, ash and gases during firing.

And yes, I am apparently still immature enough to be amused by the traditional job title **“saggar maker's bottom knocker.”**

![Old wooden workbench and shelves filled with saggars inside the Victorian pottery workshop.](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/saggars.jpg)

Inside the saggar-making workshop, where the containers used to protect pottery during firing were made.

## Experiencing a potter's wheel without sight

One of the best parts of the visit for us came when we reached the throwing demonstration.

Obviously, simply watching somebody demonstrate a potter's wheel isn't particularly useful to John because he is completely blind. The demonstrator took the time to explain what she was doing while John was able to explore a separate wheel through touch.

He could feel the wheel turning and compare the slower movement near the centre with the faster-moving outside edge while she explained how the speed is changed during the process of throwing a pot.

It was a relatively simple adjustment, but it turned a largely visual demonstration into something John could actually experience and understand.

![We can see John's hands touching a small potter's wheel. A staff member is in front of him pointing out different parts of the wheel. There are some sponges in front of her.](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/potterswheel.jpg)

John and the potter's wheel

## Casting – of more than one kind

Our next stop was the slip-casting workshop.

I announced, perfectly innocently, “So this is casting.”

John immediately replied that he thought he'd broken his arm and was in need of casting.

It turned out his terrible joke wasn't entirely as ridiculous as it sounded. The demonstrator explained that the moulds used for slip casting are made from **plaster of Paris** – the same material traditionally associated with plaster casts.

She also explained that what looks very much like liquid clay isn't technically “liquid clay”. The clay is suspended in water with chemicals that help keep it in suspension and allow it to pour properly.

![A woman is holding a jug of slip and is about to pour it into a casting mould.](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/slip.jpg)

The slip being poured in a mould.

## Staffordshire oatcakes… cooked in a kiln?

Then John's habit of saying whatever happens to enter his head led us to one of my favourite bits of information from the entire visit.

Hearing the term “biscuit firing”, he asked whether putting things into a kiln made you hungry because he couldn't imagine biscuit firing without thinking about biscuits.

That prompted the demonstrator to tell us what **they used to do when she worked in the labs**.

They would wrap traditional Staffordshire oatcakes in foil and put them into a small test kiln on a low temperature for about an hour to warm them.

## My rather distant Wedgwood connection

Talking about the local pottery industry also gave me an excuse to bring out my extremely distant claim to fame.

My mum was from Stoke-on-Trent and, while researching my family tree, I discovered that **Josiah Wedgwood's paternal grandparents were my eight-times great-grandparents**. My seven-times great-grandmother was the sister of Josiah's father and married into the Sneyd family, who built Keele Hall.

So I'm still waiting for my share of the Wedgwood fortune.

I may be waiting for some time.

## China flowers and traditional skills

We also watched a demonstration of traditional china flower making. It is one of those skills where watching somebody experienced do it makes something extremely intricate look deceptively easy.

The flower maker told us that she used to make around **40 dozen flowers a day**.

John was again given the opportunity to experience something through touch, feeling some of the soft, unfired material rather than having to rely entirely on somebody describing a visual demonstration to him.

![A woman has placed the clay flower she just made into John's hands, so he can feel it](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/flower.jpg)

The flower maker demonstrator showing John the flower she just made

## Inside a bottle oven

Of course, you can't really visit Gladstone without going inside one of its enormous bottle ovens.

Standing outside them doesn't quite convey how big they are. Once inside, you can look upwards into the huge brick structure and see the saggars stacked inside.

Elsewhere, another bottle oven recreates the firing process. The original doorway would have been bricked up during firing, and the museum has recreated this with a small viewing hole giving a glimpse of the “fire” inside.

![](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/bottleoven.jpg)

![](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/firing.jpg)

On the left we see a bottle oven partially stacked with saggars. On the right we can see the bricked up oven door, with the small viewing hole.

## Flushed with Pride

The final major section we visited was *Flushed with Pride*, Gladstone's exhibition about the history of toilets and sanitation.

Unfortunately, the lift to the exhibition was out of order on the day we visited, so we had to use the stairs.

At the entrance to the 1840s section, we were introduced to the reality of overcrowded Victorian housing without running water, proper drainage or flushing toilets.

Then we went inside.

And discovered that whoever designed the reconstruction had been rather committed to authenticity.

The first reconstructed privy even appeared to have a hen underneath it — if you looked down the hole, you could just see the top of its red comb.

![An old wooden privy. It has some stains in front of the hole and we can just about see the top of a hen's head in the privy.](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/content/images/2026/09/privy.jpg)

The first reconstructed privy — complete, apparently, with a hen underneath it. Look closely and you can just see its red comb.

There was also a smell.

A **very** convincing smell.

I was trying to continue filming and describing the reconstructed privies, but the smell was genuinely awful and I was doing my best not to gag. Matters weren't helped by looking down the second privy and discovering that they'd also supplied some extremely lifelike contents.

I didn't stay to admire those for very long.

## Accessibility at Gladstone Pottery Museum

Gladstone is an unusual place to assess for accessibility because many of the things that make it fascinating are also the things that can create barriers.

It is a historic Victorian industrial site. There are **cobbles in the courtyard**, changes of level, old doorways and historic buildings. On our visit, the lift serving *Flushed with Pride* was also out of order, meaning that we had to use the stairs.

On the positive side, there was an accessible ramped entrance, and what particularly stood out to us was the attitude of the demonstrators. They took time to explain things to John and, where possible, enabled him to experience things through touch rather than assuming that a visual demonstration was enough.

For us, that made a real difference.

If you have particular access requirements, I would contact the museum before travelling, especially because access to individual areas can potentially be affected by the historic nature of the buildings, maintenance and filming.

## Things to know before you visit

Gladstone Pottery Museum is on **Uttoxeter Road, Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, ST3 1PQ**.

At the time of our visit, opening was limited because filming for *The Great Pottery Throw Down* was taking place. Some parts of the museum were also unavailable to us for the same reason. **Check the museum website immediately before your visit for current opening days, times and admission prices.**

There is limited Blue Badge parking – from memory, approximately four spaces – and the main courtyard is cobbled.

We paid **£14.80 altogether**: concession admission for John and George, with me admitted free as a carer. That is simply what we paid on our visit and shouldn't be taken as a current price guide.

I'd also recommend checking which demonstrations are taking place if there is something in particular you want to see, as these can vary.

## Would we recommend Gladstone Pottery Museum?

Yes. Even though we'd been before, there was plenty we'd either forgotten or discovered for the first time.

For us, the best parts weren't necessarily the exhibits you simply look at. They were the conversations with the demonstrators: John being able to experience the potter's wheel through touch, discovering that plaster casts and pottery casting really do have something in common, and somehow getting from “biscuit firing” to Staffordshire oatcakes cooked in a test kiln.

And I probably won't forget the authentic smell of an 1840s privy in a hurry.

## Watch our visit

Want to come around Gladstone Pottery Museum with us?

🎥 **Watch our full visit on YouTube:** 

You'll see the bottle ovens and workshops, John's tactile experience at the potter's wheel, the demonstrations we watched – and, unfortunately for me, the moment the smell in *Flushed with Pride* got the better of me.

Planning your own day out? See our full [UK carer ticket and disabled admission directory](https://specialneedsadventurefamily.com/uk-carer-tickets-disabled-admission-directory/) — carer policies, disabled parking and access notes for every place we have reviewed.