Our story

We believe a home should be built slowly.

Aurelle began in 2012 with a potter's wheel in a Portland garage and a simple refusal: to make things that don't last. Fourteen years on, that refusal is still the whole company.

Inside the Aurelle workshop with clay, wood and tools on workbenches

Where it began

From a garage studio to 12,000 homes.

Our founder, Elena Marsh, threw her first pot in art school and never really left the wheel. By day she worked in a ceramics studio; by night she fired experiments in a borrowed kiln. The pieces sold out of a farmers-market stall within a month — and the waitlist she started on a paper notebook still exists today, digitised and 4,000 names long.

We've grown from one wheel to a studio of fourteen makers, but the rhythm hasn't changed. Each batch is thrown, glazed, woven or turned by a single pair of hands. Each piece is inspected twice before it ships. And each piece carries the same promise it did in 2012: if it ever fails you, we repair it free, for life.

"We'd rather make 200 things a year that last decades than 20,000 that last a season."
— Elena Marsh, Founder

What we stand for

Four values, on every workbench.

Natural, always

Oak, wool, stoneware, brass and glass — no plastic, no composites, no shortcuts. 98% of every piece is a material you could name.

One maker, one piece

Assembly lines make identical objects. We make characterful ones — every glaze, stitch and joint signed by the person who made it.

Small footprint

Regional quarries and mills, carbon-neutral shipping, and zero plastic in any order — packaging that composts in your garden.

Repair over replace

Re-glaze the cup, re-cane the chair, re-wire the lamp. Our repair studio fixes around 300 pieces a year — free, forever.

Fair, from quarry to door

Every maker earns above living wage, every mill is audited yearly, and every order's carbon is offset at checkout. No exceptions.

Slow by design

Four seasonal collections a year, never more. We release pieces when they're ready — not when a calendar tells us to.

Fourteen years of making

The Aurelle timeline

2012

A wheel, a garage, a notebook

Elena throws her first production batch of twenty mugs. They sell out at the Portland Farmers Market in one morning; the paper waitlist begins.

2015

The first kiln and the first hire

We move into a proper studio in Southeast Portland, add a second kiln and welcome our first apprentice — now our head glazer, Mateo Ruiz.

2018

Beyond ceramics

The collection grows to lighting, textiles and oak furniture, each with its own dedicated maker and material story. The 100th piece ships.

2021

Carbon-neutral and plastic-free

Every shipment goes carbon-neutral, packaging goes fully compostable, and the repair studio opens its doors — 300+ pieces restored yearly since.

2024

The 10,000th home

We pass 10,000 homes furnished and open the Portland showroom — part gallery, part workshop, all hands-on. Come and touch everything.

Today

14 makers, 165 pieces, one promise

The studio now holds fourteen makers across five crafts. The waitlist notebook is a spreadsheet, but the rule from day one hasn't moved an inch.

The hands behind the work

Meet the makers

Elena Marsh

Founder & Potter

Twenty-five years at the wheel and still chasing the perfect curve. Elena throws every first batch of every new collection herself.

Mateo Ruiz

Head Glazer

Mateo mixes every glaze in-house from raw minerals. He can tell you the kiln temperature of a piece from its colour alone — usually to within five degrees.

Priya Anand

Lead Weaver

Priya runs the loom room and sources every wool and linen from family-run mills she has visited herself — all eleven of them.

Come and see

Every piece starts as a raw material.

Visit the Portland showroom to watch the makers at work — or start with something small and see where it leads.

Shop the Collection Visit the Showroom