A North Carolina native, Tim Turner’s upbringing was split between the school year in his hometown of Roxboro and summers spent on his grandparents’ self-sustaining farm in Mebane, NC. After all, it was the 1960s.

Tim attended Appalachian State University, not primarily for academic reasons (although it is a wonderful university) but because he wanted to play college football. He achieved that goal for one season. However, toward the end of that first season, as puddles on the practice field began to freeze over, he noticed that the basketball gym was well-heated, prompting him to switch sports.

At ASU, Tim majored in Industrial Arts and discovered a passion for ceramics, focusing on purely functional work. In 1977, he moved to Penland, NC, where he worked with Ron Propst, the first resident potter at Penland School of Crafts.

In 1982, Tim returned to Boone, NC, where he continued making pottery and opened The Potter’s Gallery, a retail space adjacent to his studio. For about fifteen years, he sold his own work alongside that of 60-70 other North Carolina craftsmen.

From the back porch of his studio, one could throw a rock into the Watauga River—a proximity that became problematic when the river flooded his space three times in his last five years there. A slow learner but a determined one, Tim eventually moved out, gave up pottery for a decade, and focused on painting, creating mainly abstract works and some loose figurative pieces.