Below are articles I wrote for Panorama North Carolina Magazine. Panorama has folded but my articles are below the photo:

The Sanford Pottery Festival is the largest pottery event in North Carolina and certainly the largest event of it's kind within the readership of this magazine. While the main emphasis is on North Carolina and "Seagrove"
pottery, the Festival accepts potters from all over the country and has had exhibitors come from as far away as Washington State. The show features well known potters both regional and national and hosts over
one hundred and twenty unique artists.

North Carolina is a state known world wide for it's pottery with the town of Seagrove and the Seagrove area being the national pottery capitol, but the term "Seagrove Pottery" is an all encompassing phrase referring to potters of a five county area that includes Chatham, Lee, Moore, Montgomery and Randolph Counties, Randolf County being home of the actual town of Seagrove, and also home of the Seagrove Pottery Festival, the "original" pottery  Festival in North Carolina. The town of Seagrove is recognized as the birthplace of traditional North Carolina Pottery. It turns out that the Sanford  Pottery Festival has it's roots in Seagrove through Richard Gillson, the driving force and inspiration behind both Festivals.

Gillson died in a tragic accident in January of this year after a fall from a ladder but his vision still lives in both festivals and many other pottery promoting endeavors started under his leadership.

The upcoming Sanford Pottery Festival is paying tribute to Gillson because he did more than any other person to promote pottery in the heart of North Carolina.

While pottery fans sometimes somethings think there is a rivalry between the older Seagrove Festival and the newer Sanford Pottery Festival, they were designed originally by Gillson and Sanford Pottery Festival creator Don Hudson to compliment each other. The Seagrove Festival caters exclusively to Seagrove Area potters while the Sanford event was designed to take all qualified clay artisans with emphasis on Seagrove area potters. Both festivals have benefited from mutual cooperation by sharing information and advice throughout the years, and according to Don Hudson, the Sanford event would have never come into being without the visionary ideas of potter Richard Gillson.

In addition to creating the twenty-seven year old Seavgrove Pottery Festival, Gillon and Hudson also worked
to create the extraordinary pottery exhibit featured at the yearly State  Fair in Raleigh, an all encompassing showcase designed to promote both festivals and regional and state potters. The State Fair exhibit has become so important that it has drawn attention of Raleigh lawmakers who have approached fellow members to encourage expansion of the annual display. Gillson created the Seagrove Pottery Festival 27 years ago and was the major in the creation of the Sanford Pottery Festival.The story behind the story of the two evens if one of of cooperation for the benefit of all, potters, pottery collectors and art aficianos. Since the
beginning of the Sanford Festival, Seagrove show has grown significantly since the Sanford festival and this years Sanford festival will celebrate the life and legacy of Richard Gillson at the same time that it seeks to help raise funds to keep his vision of a permanent home for the Museum in downtown Seagrove.

Gillsons death leaves a great void in the pottery community and places many local pottery arts endeavors in
jeopardy, according to Hudson, who says that no matter what amount of work it took "Richard somehow got it done, with money, time, community support, whatever". Gillsons efforts include securing real estate and
financing for the Museum of North Carolina Traditional Pottery in Seagvove, which is now open to showcase the work of potters from all over the Seagrove area, the survival of which is now complicated by the death of it's visionary founder.

In keeping Gillson's vision the Sanford Pottery Festival was originally envisioned as a way of bringing one of the states traditional arts closer to the Triangle area of North Carolina utilizing it's proximity to Chapel Hill and Raleigh and the roads that connect the area to Sanford which has the thoroughfare of Highway 421 and is roughly forty five minutes from Raleigh, Chapel Hill and Durham and less than an hour from Greensboro, all major metropolitan areas bringing thousands of out of town art fans who also sometimes tour the entire town of Sanford. In Historic Downtown Sanford, visitors encounter fine brick buildings and unique shops. Extensive promotion usually brings between ten and fifteen thousand attendees to the event, most living outside Lee County. This year's featured potter is Phil Morgan who began college as a business major but "walked through the wrong door" into a pottery studio and after time became an artist. Now along with his wife Julia they produce fine hand turned porcelain enriched with unique crystalline glazes. In addition to featured artists at the Sanford Pottery Festival you can find traditional and contemporary clay creations in extraordinary variety. Each booth seems overflowing with one of a kind  creations that are turned on a traditional wheel, hand built, carved clay sculptures and some done in techniques that can't be readily identified but are nonetheless extraordinary. Pottery fans know glazes and it's rare to find more beautifully finished pieces and colors than at the Sanford Pottery Festival. Traditional brown clay colored face jugs are just next door to avant guide colored bowls and large art items with detailed paintings with both traditional and modern motifs. Talking about glazes is a favorite pastime of those who collect pottery but it's rare that a potter will give up the formula to unique glaze recipes since it can often take thousands of hours of experimenting and years trying the right combinations to create that "special something" that makes a potters art their own. You can also see the unique vision of each potter in the way pottery items are created one at a time by hand. People interested in pottery will be amazed at the extensive selection and extraordinary artistic expertise displayed by the world finest clay artisans when attending the Sanford Pottery Festival. The festival is a great family event for all,and because of it's date near Mothers Day, it's especially a great day to show Mom how much she appreciated. Don Hudson, the festivals creator quips "Your mother gave you birth, the least you can do is give her pottery", and adds "Maybe money can't buy love, but you can invest in brownie points".

The Sanford Pottery Festival has seven year tradition of being held the week before Mothers Day and will take place this year on May

3-4 at the Dennis A Wicker Civic Center There is plenty of parking and getting into the center is quick and easy. Admission is five dollars and children under six are free.

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A North Carolina native Pete Gulley was born in in the tiny Edgecome County town of Tarrboro. After serving in the US military as a Green Beret he attended East Carolina University and majored in physical education. Settling in Virgina Beach after college seemed like a logical choice after marrying in 1971, but after a time Pete began to feel the the flowering of another interest when he felt an inner urge to try his hand the art and science of horticulture. Discovering the existence of Sandhills College and it's renowned horticulture program, he and his wife sold literally everything and moved to Southern Pines so Pete could pursue his dream of working with plants. Living on the GI Bill and working toward his graduation Pete and his wife rented a vacant building and opened a garden center selling almost nothing nothing but azaleas. "Calling it a shoestring venture doesn't come close" says Pete. "I didn't even have the rent money at the time,but the azaleas kept selling".With each load I picked up and sold, I garnered more credit and attracted more customer interest in my business". After losing the lease to the original building they purchased the house next door was and filled the front lot with plants. From there the business grew says Pete: "My entire family became involved" and Gulley's Garden Center soon became a family concern employing his son Graham, daughter Megan and his wife, Linda who, sadly died in 2005.

Gulley's Garden Center has been in business since 1974 and has grown from humble beginnings of an near empty building selling little more than azaleas and a few flowers into an entire complex of structures located on Southeast Broad Street in the middle of downtown Southern Pines, just beside the railroad. The Garden Center features an extensive variety of plants, shrubs, a large nursery as well as many materials for the home owner, plant hobbies and even the professional landscaper as well as anyone looking to create green creations ranging from a window sill box to a fine and expansive garden. Pete Gulleys humble dream of keeping the business afloat from month to month has grown so successful that it now employees a dozen person staff, each of them fully educated in the field of plants obtained from years of practical experience and interaction with the different needs of customers. "One of our main focuses is on plant education" says Pete, "but sometimes our customers actually educate us". This close relationship and focus on service has lead to tremendous loyalty in the Sandhills area to Gulley's Garden Center.

Gulley's Garden Center isn't just a place to purchase plants and supplies and has been become a genuine tourist attraction which for some people is a destination spot not to be missed when visiting the area. A year round Christmas House now adorns a complex of buildings which are decorated with water fountains and water wheels with gardens that feature continuous music heightening the sensory experience of all visitors. Upstairs one building houses "The Military Museum" that features military collectibles dating from the Civil War to the modern theater of Afghanistan. Veterans will often visit the complex just to see this exhibit and often educational school groups are ushered into the museum which is free of charge to all. On the outside of building complex, antique gas pumps adorn the pathways with old farm equipment from various locales showcasing technology from different generations. Once inside one main building, there a sort of social gathering place where people congregate and converse in front of a unique wood burning fire place.

Gulleys Garden Center is not simply a place selling plant supplies to people looking for pretty flowers, but also a local concern that draws both tourist and locals because of a unique quality that combines both business and personal interests of it's owner, someone who has created an extension of his own personality by turning the ethereal nature of the love of plants into a concrete and mortar tribute to all his interests. Pete Gulley and his Garden Center is proof positive that those who try hard enough can succeed in the pursuit of the American Dream.