The Carbondale Clay Center's Main Street studio is a 2,000-square-foot cinderblock building on the east end of downtown. Its own campaign brochure describes waitlists and backed-up kilns. This season, the center's holiday pottery isn't on sale in that building. It's on the shelves of a frame shop farther west on Main Street. Its newest classes run in a unit on 12th Street, and its biggest night of the year is in a barn at River Valley Ranch.
The center works out of more than one building this holiday season because it no longer fits in one. Every date on its December calendar connects to that move.
Why the Clay Center Now Has a Second Studio
The 12th Street Annex at 215 12th Street, Unit D, is the center's second working studio. It has wheel and handbuilding space, adult and youth classes, independent study, shelf rentals, Makers Membership and open studio time. The Annex fires at Cone 6, which the center calls medium-fire. The Main Street studio fires at Cone 10, or high-fire, so a potter in each building gets a different range of clay bodies and glazes. Studio hours at the Annex run 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. Clay is sold at both locations during office hours.
In the center's words, "It's no secret that we are bursting at the seams and cannot meet current demand." The Annex is meant to shorten waitlists now while the center raises money for a permanent home. That home is planned for 2027, and the center says the Main Street studio may be unavailable for a stretch along the way. If that happens, the Annex will make room for current shelf and studio renters and Makers Members, with fewer classes in the meantime.
So the Annex is how the center plans to keep people working through construction. The holiday sale is already somewhere else.
The Holiday Sale Is at a Frame Shop
The center's Holiday Invitational is a cash-and-carry sale of work by more than 10 local and national ceramic artists. It runs Nov. 9 through Dec. 23 at Main Street Gallery & The Framer, 399 Main St. Cash-and-carry means you pay and walk out with the piece, with no waiting for the show to close.
According to The Sopris Sun, the frame shop's owner, Cate Tallmadge, sits on the Clay Center's board and offered to host the center's gallery during construction. This holiday show is the first chance to see that arrangement at work.
The opening reception was Nov. 13. The next date for the Invitational is a special sale on the evening of Light Up Carbondale.
Friday, Dec. 4, Hour by Hour
Carbondale Arts lists Light Up Carbondale as December's First Friday, running 5 to 8 p.m. The Clay Center's special sale overlaps it, so the evening runs as one sequence along Main Street:
- 5 p.m. Main Street closes to traffic from Weant Boulevard to Third Street, and Fourth Street closes from Main to the alley. The full closure lasts until 9 p.m.
- 5:30 p.m. Santa arrives at Weant Boulevard and Main Street to light the Forest Service tree and the Main Street tree lights.
- 5:45 to 7:45 p.m. Free Santa sleigh rides line up at 4th and Main. Cocoa, cookies, a bonfire, caroling, community booths and food trucks fill the same block.
- 6 to 8 p.m. The Clay Center's Holiday Invitational special sale at 399 Main St.
- Until 7 p.m. Carbondale Arts' Deck the Walls market stays open late at The Launchpad, 76 S. 4th Street.
With Main Street shut until 9, there's time to walk from the tree lighting at Weant to the sleigh rides at 4th and on to the pottery sale at 399 Main.
Deck the Walls Grew This Year
Deck the Walls is Carbondale Arts' annual holiday market in its gallery at The Launchpad. This year it lists more than 70 vendors over a five-and-a-half-week run that ends Dec. 24. That's up from the "over 60" artists on the 2025 market's page. The market is open now, so a Light Up visit doesn't have to be the first trip. The Clay Center fills one storefront this season, and the Launchpad gallery adds more than 70 vendors' worth of local work a block off Main.
A Barn at River Valley Ranch and About 250 Cups
The center's 29th Annual Cup Auction is Friday, Dec. 11, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Old Thompson Barn at River Valley Ranch, 333 River Valley Ranch Road. A donor preview is Dec. 10. About 250 handmade cups from artists around the country go up for bid, and bidding closes at 8:30 p.m. The center says the dance party is back this year.
It's the center's main community fundraiser, and the center says the money goes to its programs, artist residencies and exhibitions, from classes to kids' activities and outreach. Those programs are the ones that outgrew Main Street, and the Annex is where many of them now run.
The Rest of the Season
| Date | Event | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Open now through Dec. 23 | Holiday Invitational, Carbondale Clay Center | Main Street Gallery & The Framer, 399 Main St. |
| Open now through Dec. 24 | Deck the Walls, Carbondale Arts | The Launchpad, 76 S. 4th Street |
| Fri., Dec. 4, 5 to 8 p.m. | Light Up Carbondale | Main Street, Weant Blvd. to 4th St. |
| Fri., Dec. 11, 6 to 9 p.m. | 29th Annual Cup Auction | Old Thompson Barn, River Valley Ranch |
| Tue., Dec. 15, 4 to 5:30 p.m. | Kids' Holiday Sale | Clay Center Main Street Studio |
| Sat., Dec. 19, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. | Bonedale Winter Bonanza | Carbondale Creative District |
The Kids' Holiday Sale is the one event this season in the original building. Kids shop for handmade gifts, and the center's calendar prices items at $10 or less. The Bonedale Winter Bonanza is no longer new. The Sopris Sun called it an inaugural event in December 2024. Carbondale Arts' listing promotes local shopping, food and drink, and winter activities across the Creative District, with more details still to come.
What Is Planned for 135 Main Street
The center's permanent home will be a new building on its current lot at 135 Main Street. The Town of Carbondale's Planning and Zoning Commission minutes record an 8–0 vote approving the site plan with conditions on March 13, 2025.
CCY Architects designed a two-story building with larger classrooms, studios and a gallery, plus a maker space, a kiln yard that doubles as a pocket park, and a rooftop deck. It's laid out to open onto both Main Street and the Rio Grande Trail. In its December 2025 reporting, the Post Independent put the building at about 9,000 square feet, up from the 8,000 described when the campaign was announced. Either figure is several times the size of the current cinderblock studio.
The capital campaign's goal is about $10 million, per the same Post Independent report. As of Dec. 19, 2025, The Aspen Local reported that the center had raised almost $4 million. The center's own timeline still says 2027. Until then, its pottery is for sale at 399 Main, its newest classes run on 12th Street, and its cinderblock studio at 135 Main is still in use.
New buildings on Main Street's east end affect more than one block. If you own nearby and want to know how changes like this one might show up in your home's value, Corey Crocker is glad to talk it through over coffee at your convenience. Get a Confidential Home Valuation.
