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ALL OF MALCOLM's work is fired in a massive 21 foot long by 6 foot wide wood-fire kiln which Wright built of raw brick. Dug into the side of the hill on his property and sheltered by an enormous roof, the kiln is architecturally based on the Roman arch and seems to have a presence of its own, waiting to come to life by being filled with over 600 clay pieces, then fed thousands of sticks of wood, attaining 2500°F temperatures and being tended in processes involving 30 hours of firing and 5 days of cooling. 
Wood firing is a fast growing part of today's clay world. There may be 300 to 400 wood fired kilns all across the country. No two are alike, being of all sizes and shapes, and are all fired differently, taking anywhere from six hours to ten days. WHY DO WE GO TO ALL THIS TROUBLE? There are several reasons. 1. Pottery involves process: throwing, trimming, decorating, glazing, and countless other hands-on tasks. Fire is untouchable, but stoking wood makes us feel we are part of the firing process. We have to figure out how much wood to stoke, how to get the wood to the right place at the right time, how to control the atmosphere and temperature by adjusting the right volume of wood with the right amount of air. It is a great pleasure to feel the quiet power of the fire building up to 2500°F. 2. Wood is a renewable resource. We prefer using the edgings, which are the waste product from a local sawmill, rather than oil, gas or electricity. All the great pottery of the past was fired using wood, charcoal, coal or dung, until 100 years ago. 3. Perhaps the most important reason is both aesthetic and technical at the same time. The flame is very large, filling the whole kiln, touching some pots more than others, affecting the side of the pot towards the heat differently than its other side, changing the color of the clay and glaze. At high temperatures, glaze is like honey. Wood ashes are carried though the kiln on the draft, and can stick to the front of a pot, melting and changing the chemistry of the glaze and affecting its color and texture. These changes take control of the finished pot away from us, allowing the pot to be itself. 
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