Costa Mesa, California · Est. 2022 · Founded by Carrie & Ava Thobe (mother & daughter)
Ava Thobe has been throwing clay since she was four years old, on the same wheel her grandmother bought in the late 1960s. Her grandmother earned a master's in ceramics at Cal State Long Beach. She taught Ava's mom. Ava's mom taught her. In 2022, Ava and her mother Carrie turned three generations of that lineage into Glazed Garage -- a Costa Mesa ceramics studio making handcrafted pieces for the everyday table.
The story of Glazed Garage starts before Ava Thobe was born. Her grandmother fell in love with clay in the late 1960s, went back to school, and earned a master's in ceramics at Cal State Long Beach in the early 70s. She taught Ava's mother Carrie. Carrie taught Ava. And in the backyard the whole time sat her grandmother's wheel -- the same one Ava was throwing on by the time she was four years old.
Ava grew up with clay under her fingernails and small business in her blood -- both her parents ran their own companies, and somewhere along the way it became clear that Glazed Garage was the natural meeting point of all of it. In 2022, she and her mother launched the studio from Costa Mesa, California, designing handcrafted ceramics infused with the light and palette of the Southern California coast. Plates, bowls, mugs, pitchers -- functional pieces made for daily use, the kind that anchor a kitchen and accumulate meaning over years. On a registry, Glazed Garage is a gift with a lineage. Three generations of hands that understood what clay could be, and one studio that finally brought it all together.
