"Time on her hands
So she took up pottery"
Wimbledon News, 1970

When Wimbledon housewife, Mrs Billie Cook, Sunnyside, gave up work, she found she had time on her hands. So she started going to part-time pottery classes – and now professionals agree she is one of the most promising amateur potters in years.

She has just had her second exhibition at the Gordon Gallery, Wimbledon, where her spare time pots, lamps and ashtrays have been bought for anything up to 10 guineas.

Scottish born Mrs Cook, 38, who has never had any formal art training, said : “I have always been interested in art , so I enrolled at Putney Art School for the Pottery Classes. “ Now she has her own work-shop in the garden with a kiln and her original ideas have captured the imagination of both the public and her fellow- potters.

Mr Bill Bridges of the Gordon Gallery is very impressed by Mrs Cook’s work and sees a great future for her. When she first came to see me a year ago, I was very impressed indeed and very glad to include her work at the Gallery. I would say she has the best talent of any potter I know.

“Other potters have seen her work and tell me she is quite outstanding and we have sold more of her work than any other potter we have had.”

All Mrs Cook’s are basically useful and she gets her shapes and ideas from nature and drawings she has made at the Natural History Museum.

Now their influence is obvious in her work. Some pots have the chunky, rough texture of rock formations and others are taken from seeds and plants.

She has been very encouraged by the sale of her work and says she feel as if she is just beginning.

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