During the 1890s, Reginald Wells trained as a sculptor at the Royal College of Art, and later studied ceramics at Camberwell School of Art. Around 1900 he set up his own pottery at Coldrum, near Wrotham in Kent, before later moving to London. Wells can lay claim to being one of the first true studio potters, working on an entirely independent basis. His interests also lay in exactly those areas that were to preoccupy studio potters in later decades, namely English slipwares and Chinese stonewares. Wells' work has a somewhat amateur and experimental look when compared to that of Leach, Cardew and Staite Murray, who were to follow in his path.