Burlington, NC · Est. 2012 · Founded by Mark Warren and Chris Pence
A small ceramics studio in Burlington, North Carolina, Haand makes porcelain dinnerware and home objects designed for everyday use. Each piece is thrown, trimmed, and glazed by hand by a team of twenty in a 13,000 square foot former hosiery mill. The name is an archaic Norwegian word for hand, dating back centuries.
Haand was founded in 2012 by Mark Warren and Chris Pence, two friends who met as teenagers in Jacksonville, Florida. Mark, an artist and tinkerer, attended the Penland School of Crafts on a two-year fellowship, where he was introduced to ceramics and slip casting in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Chris, a potter since high school, studied business and accounting in college and worked in corporate accounting while continuing to throw on the side. When Chris was ready to leave the corporate world and Mark finished his fellowship, the timing felt right to build something together.
The first year of Haand was run out of a decrepit farmhouse with no potable water and unreliable electricity. Rent was sixty dollars a month. Mark and Chris hustled at gift shows and bid for niche manufacturing contracts, fighting for every sale. Today, the studio employs twenty people and produces dinnerware for over 175 restaurants, many of them James Beard Award winners. Everything is still made by hand.
