I never wanted to do something grotesque. I never wanted to shock. I wanted my audience to be happy, to be kind.

I think with my hands. I design things to be touched-not for a museum. A piece is ready when it has the shape of something to cherish.

When you have clay in your hands, it's hard to avoid making birds.

To be different is a negative motive, and no creative thought or created thing grows out of a negative impulse. A negative impulse is always frustrating. And to be different means ‘not like this’ and ‘not like that.’ And the ‘not like’—that’s why postmodernism, with the prefix of ‘post,’ couldn’t work. No negative impulse can work, can produce any happy creation. Only a positive one.

I am a maker of useful things.

I don't know the difference between working and not working.

I don't like to design single objects. I like my pieces to have a relationship to each other. They can be mother and child, like the Schmoo salt and pepper shakers, or brother and sister like the Birdie salt and peppers, or cousins, like most of my dinnerware sets.