Designer-maker Katie Smith creates ceramic vessels that portray narratives through both form and illustration. Her work focuses on reflecting experiences and events through ceramics, using texture and surface decoration to tell stories, while also making pieces that people are drawn to touch. Employing various methods and techniques to achieve a textural finish, Smith focuses on creating hand-built forms and maximalist surfaces. She embraces the textural quality of clay, utilising various decorative techniques to enhance the quality of the ceramic itself. Smith draws influence from the world around her as well as historical objects to create her thought provoking works. Her forms are often traditional in shape but modern in style, as she attempts to update conventional ceramic structures, adding contemporary elements to established shapes. Her graduate collection ‘The People’s Pandemic’ explores the Coronavirus pandemic, looking at how different groups of people have been impacted.