By CASEY NEILL
A family pottery in Pakenham counts Australia’s culinary cream among its clients.
And the list of well-known names eating from Robert Gordon crockery doesn’t end with MasterChef’s George Calombaris and Vue de Monde’s Shannon Bennett.
Robert ‘Andy’ Gordon said his team produced dinnerware for Canberra’s Parliament House a few years ago.
“It was driven by Nick Xenophon and John Madigan,” he said.
“They were sick of eating off imported plates in the cafe.
“And all our stuff is in State Parliament House in Victoria.”
Andy said a change in dining style had opened up the best restaurants to Robert Gordon and its counterparts.
“It’s not fine dining anymore, it’s more sharing plates. It’s more suitable to our type of product,” he said.
“It’s a big buzz, especially when we do a good restaurant fit-out or people come to us.
“Traditionally when I started, our market was retail.
“But now what’s keeping us going is hospitality.”
Robert Gordon also imports some products it’s designed and developed in China.
“Fifteen years ago we would have gone broke if we hadn’t,” Andy said.
“The imports really swamped the market.
“Australian made really was no longer in favour, so much.
“We started importing and that provided us with reasonable profitability to stay afloat.
“But now what’s happening is that Australian made is outgrowing our imports, the demand has come back really strongly.
“Other potteries that have hung in there through the bad times, the same thing’s happening.
“There’s a real resurgence in hand-made again, in bespoke.”
That resurgence has helped to fuel a Robert Gordon expansion make it the biggest manufacturing pottery in Australia in terms of clay consumption.
Its Mulcahy Road site will this year grow to include a new warehouse on a neighbouring block.
“This is not a proper warehouse,” Andy said gesturing around the packed room.
“It’s too low and it’s very congested.
“All our imports will move across into our new warehouse and this will become a tourist destination and a proper manufacturing plant again.
“We’re investing in new kilns, we’re replacing all our old kilns.
“We will have pathways for people to visit us.
“We’ve got new offices going in. Our old offices will be demolished and that will be all open retail space with a restaurant.”
Andy followed his mother and father into pottery, and his four children with wife Barbara have done the same.
“The kids gradually came into the business, which was great,” he said.
“Now they’re running it and I’m the odd-job man!
“The good thing about it is that they’re all happy to have different interests in the business.
“I’m very lucky they’ve got different personalities.”
Hannah is the eldest and “gets stuck with all the strange admin submissions and importing and logistical stuff”.
“Hannah did business and management studies,” Andy said.
“Kate trained in graphic design – she’s got two degrees, one’s fine art and one is in fabric design.
“Kate does the design and decorating, she’s the last word on all of that although we all dabble.”
Next is Bobby, who’s an architect who ran his own business.
“Bobby’s very methodical and really needed,” Andy said.
Sam is the youngest and is “the seller, the marketer”.
“Sam’s degree is still pending. He bombed out of uni pretty early,” Andy laughed.
“He knows George (Calombaris), he knows Vue de Monde, he knows all the chefs. He does the connecting.”
Andy explained that every Robert Gordon product started in the mould shop.
“We design and develop product. Glauco’s a brilliant mould-maker. His father was a mould-maker in Italy so he’s really steeped in the tradition of ceramics,” he said.
“We start off with a concept. We do the moulds here.
“Some shapes we cast, and some shapes we put on a press or what’s called a Jigger and Jolley machine.”
The seams are cleaned off the shaped clay and it’s into the kiln to be bisque fired at “a low temperature” – about 1000 degrees.
“The shapes are then put onto these shelves at this stage and then they’re glazed and decorated,” Andy said.
The glazing is done by hand, and then it’s back on the kiln carts for firing at gloss temperature – 1280 degrees.
“What we do is high-fired stoneware, and it’s something that I’ve always done,” he said.
“The difference with a stoneware product is it’s what’s called vitrified.
“It’s very hard and hard-wearing and if the glaze is chipped nothing will happen – it will still function as a pot.
“Whereas with an earthenware, if you break the glaze surface then because the body’s not vitrified, it’s still chalky, it absorbs moisture into the body and expands and cracks and eventually disintegrates.”
A final inspection post-kiln sends 5 to 10 per cent of products into the seconds shop and the rest to dining tables around the country.
