Your Home Needs an Enormous Clay Pot

Tall clay pots and ceramic pieces repeatedly appear across home interiors, adding height, texture, and material depth in kitchens and entryways. Examples include limestone and terra-cotta vessels, Provençal confit pots, and Chinese ceramics used as grounding decor. Jeremiah Brent and Nate Berkus use Portuguese farmhouse pottery throughout their home, including aged terra-cotta pots, ribbed ceramics, glazed pieces on marble tables, and a chalky weathered vase filled with orchard branches. The widespread use of oversized vessels reflects an aspirational interior style that is intentional rather than manicured, embracing imperfections and accumulation over time. Found vessels are valued for their lived history and for adding meaning rather than simply filling space.

"A found vessel has already lived a life,” Amy Kehoe, cofounder of the eponymous brand she started with Todd Nickey, says. “When we're sourcing, we're always asking, 'Does this piece add a layer of meaning, or just fill a shelf?'” Kehoe says the irregularity of the piece is essential: off-kilter, patchy glazework, and a very legible human touch that makes a"

"But no homes are so possessed with pottery of the truly enormous variety as Jeremiah Brent and Nate Berkus, whose Portuguese farmhouse appears on the cover of our June issue. Over 3,000 miles from home on Fifth Avenue, the star-studded duo turned to the Alentejo region itself for their clay pieces: aged terra-cotta pots flank the entryway, a towering ribbed ceramic in olive beckons in the hallway, an enormous pot in the entry hall was found on the property itself, a glazed piece adorns a rosso antico marble table, a giant terra-cotta amphora lurks behind the dining table, and the kitchen dining space is a pottery gold mine-in particular a chalky, weathered vase that commands the entire room, brimming with branches cut from their orchard."

"The ubiquity of these towering pieces speaks to a new style of aspirational interior: Not one that's manicured, but intentional with its imperfections and thoughtfully accumulated over time. I thought of one retailer instantly, who has perfected-if not coined-the look themselves: Nickey Kehoe. I went straight to the source for their take on a clay statement piece."

Read at Architectural Digest