This potting wheel is of a type known as a 'kick wheel' because it is rotated by kicking with the foot. It is of Continental rather than British design. British wheels are set into a basin which serves to protect the potter from being spattered by water or bits of clay. Continental potters, whose wheels lack the basin component, use less water, cover their clothes with a large protective cloth, and take particular care as they work to reduce spattering.
The renowned studio potter, Lucie Rie (1902-95), brought this wheel from Vienna to London when she emigrated. She was a member of the Jewish community and fled the advance of Nazism in 1938. She installed the wheel in her studio on the ground floor of her home,18 Albion Mews, Paddington, London, where she worked until her death in 1995. The contents of her studio were preserved and moved to the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery, Stoke-on-Trent. A selection of items from one corner of Rie's studio were redisplayed in gallery 143 of the V&A in 2009 as part of the redevelopment of the ceramics galleries. The exact positioning of these items was replicated as far as possible from old photographs in order to evoke Rie's working conditions and show some of the equipment and materials she used to produce her pots and buttons.