About Us
MCS Clay Studios is located to the East of US 19 near Drew Street in the Clearwater 19 Commerce Center. It provides interactive experiences and education in the Art of Clay. MCS Clay Studios serves as a facility that offers diverse and exciting classes, activities, opportunities, and adventures for students of all ages. Participants will learn a wide range of basic clay techniques including the use of a potter’s wheel, hand-building, forming, construction, surface treatment, and a variety of methods to decorate and glaze ceramic ware.
If you are looking for a professional studio with a relaxed, fun atmosphere to make your artwork … you have just found it! You instructor cares, because she owns the place!
Martha Stolz
Owner, Martha Stolz began working in clay in the late 1970’s after taking classes through the City of Clearwater. At that time the City of Clearwater did not have electric wheels, so she learned to throw on a kick wheel, creating her own power in making pottery.
In early 2010, Martha and her family visited the St. Petersburg Clay Company and Highwater Clay as her daughter needed a tool for her high school ceramics class. Martha’s husband and daughters encouraged her to enroll in classes through the Morean Arts Center for Clay that summer. She found that, like riding a bicycle, she had not really forgotten the basics of how to throw a pottery bowl. It was an adjustment to use an electric wheel, but she knew that 30 years later she could never have used a kick wheel!
Martha’s work is also on display and available for purchase at the Cat’s Meow in Pineville, Georgia, near Calloway Gardens and at Criativity in Largo, Florida. As well as yarn bowls at The Stitchery of St. Simons, St. Simons Island, GA
She creates each piece of pottery by hand from start to finish with special attention given to detail that can be felt as well as seen. Most pottery pieces start as a simple lump of clay on my pottery wheel. The clay is then transformed into objects of beauty that can be used in our everyday world.
Her bowls, mugs, yarn bowls, jars and vases are made using wheel-thrown pottery techniques. Martha’s ornaments are made using hand building pottery techniques. Many of her pottery pieces have underglaze floral designs to add color. She uses stoneware clay in the production of her pottery. All of her pottery products are microwave, oven, and dishwasher safe. See all Martha’s work at MCS Clay Studios.
Nate Greenwood
Ceramist, technician and educator, Nate Greenwood now brings his passion for ceramics to MCS Clay! A Michigan native, where he owned his own pottery studio for 14 years, Nate has been an art teacher for 22 years. Holding degrees in Studio Art, Education and the Humanities, Nate and his family are now full time Florida residents. 
MCS Clay Studios is a working pottery/art studio where technique and creativity are nurtured. We offer pottery classes, dedicated studio spaces, and member at large opportunities. MCS Clay Studios offers the practiced potter spacious work areas, top of the line Shimpo wheels, slab roller, glazes and firing. Studio membership is for everyone–from the questioning beginner, to the off and on hobbyist, to the experienced potter producing work for sale.
Our Mission Statement
MCS Clay Studios strives to inspire and nurture people’s lives through artistic self-expression.
We Give Back to Our Community
Pack-a-Snack
Pack-a-Snack is a community involvement program sponsored by Pinellas County Schools, to serve elementary students that have been identified as chronically hungry. Each student identified will receive a sack of food with approximately ten nutritious snacks in it each weekend.
Community partners such as local religious organizations or agencies agree to support a school for the school year. The community partner is responsible for funding, shopping, packing, and delivering the food to the school each week.
The school is responsible for identifying the students in need, contacting parents for consent, and checking for food allergies. The school will determine how to pass out the food each Friday; keeping the student’s confidentiality a priority.
Pack-a-Snack began in one elementary school in 2008 and is now in almost every elementary school and four middle schools in Pinellas County. Each Friday, approximately 4500 PaS bags go home with students for the weekend. The program has sustained itself and grown through the generosity and good will of the citizens of Pinellas County who continue to support our most vulnerable school children.
MCS Clay Studios supports the Pack A Snack program in Pinellas County schools and will hold special events throughout the year benefiting their program.
