Our story

Our family has been creating functional ceramics for nearly 200 years, we are already the 6th generation to make pottery. Our great-great-grandfather, Piotr Koszak, next to Alexander Bachminski, was one of the pioneers of Hutsul pottery made in the semi-majolica technique.

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The creators of ceramics were craftsmen - artists, who usually passed their skills and abilities from generation to generation. Kuty, Pistyn, Kosiv and Kolomyja (today's Ukrainian territory) were the main centers of pottery making. The most important ceramic workshops operated there, with families or individual artists. Alexander Bachminski is considered to be the creator of the Pokuttyan style proper. At the turn of the 19th/20th centuries, the main center of artistic pottery was Pistyn. Among the many potters active there, the Koszak family stood out. Piotr Koszak (1864-1941), was the son of a potter, Gregory, by whom he was orphaned at an early age. He took up the craft late at the age of 25 and lived and worked in Pistyń. He was a graduate of the National School of Ceramics in Kolomyia, and after many honors and awards, he upgraded his workshop, which allowed him to increase production and be able to improve his technique. His wife, Emilia (1851-1925), assisted him in this arduous work, in which she showed great decorative talent. After her death, Piotr Koszak married Pelagia Wozniak and taught the craft to her son, Kazimierz (1909-1990). Piotr received a gold medal at an exhibition in Lviv, for a pelvis on which he depicted the imperial family of Franz Joseph. Many of Piotr Koszak's works are in National Museums in Poland and Ukraine. 

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Kazimierz Wozniak (1909-1990) began learning pottery at the age of 16 at the side of his stepfather Piotr Koszak. After Poland regained its independence, he learned drawing at the Kolomyja ceramics school, where efforts were made to refine and refine the talents of talented potters. While apprenticing with Koszak, Wozniak learned the ins and outs of pottery making and honed his exceptional skills, especially in drawing. In time, he became co-owner of a workshop where, in addition to typical utility pottery - pots, bowls, makutr and pots - decorative, colorful tiles were made. Also original plates, vases and candlesticks, covered with a tangle of subtle drawings, elaborate genre scenes and floral motifs. On October 10, 1929 Kazimierz Wozniak married Maria Burczak in Pistyń. Until the outbreak of World War II, Wozniak's ceramics went to a store in Kolomyia. It also reached a store in Warsaw. From this work the artist supported his family of six children, his parents and built a house.

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During the occupation, he was on a train transporting forced laborers to the Reich. However, at his wife's intercession, the Germans returned him to Pistyn to produce ceramics for their needs. In total, he fired only two kilns of decorative colorful dishes, for which he was paid with basic foodstuffs. After the Germans withdrew, he was mobilized and trained in the 1st Tadeusz Kosciuszko Infantry Division on April 6, 1944. Among other things, he took part in the battles for the Pomeranian Wall, and was wounded near Nowogard. After leaving the hospital, he was assigned to the guard platoon of the 12th Cavalry Regiment of the Internal Security Corps of the Szczecin Territory. Demobilized on October 26, 1945, he returned to Pistyn, where he found his home and studio completely destroyed by the Bandera. He found his wife and children in Kolomyia. He left Kolomyia in one of the first transports and arrived in Olawa on April 4, 1946. Like many like him, he exemplifies the post-war fate of Poles who had to leave their hometowns and start life anew in unfamiliar and unfriendly conditions. Initially, he and his family lived in a small one-room apartment at 22 a Rybacka Street. A German family, with whom the Wozniak family had good relations, also lived in this building for some time.

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Of the resettlers involved in ceramics, only Kazimierz Wozniak remained faithful to the traditional ways of making pottery. However, his return to the potter's wheel was not an easy one. Between 1947 and 1958 he took on various jobs, but all the time he dreamed of returning to pottery. Among other things, he worked at a paper mill, a scrap center or as a guard at the Olawa branch of the National Bank of Poland in the city hall. In 1956, he recreated his pottery credentials, as the original ones had burned down in a fire.

Next to the house, in a small post-German garage located on the Oder River near the brewery and the town slaughterhouse, he built a pottery kiln himself, and with the help of a carpenter constructed a potter's wheel. Eventually, in 1958, he started production, but it was his additional occupation during breaks from his work at the bank.

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The breakthrough came in 1960, when Kazimierz became interested in the Association of Handicraft Manufacturers "Cepelia", which took nearly all his works. Wozniak's products reached England, the United States or Canada. Unfortunately, Wozniak's problems did not end. With the development of Olawa and the expansion of the settlement, the potter faced the dilemma of quitting his business, as the building he had previously occupied was slated for demolition. Despite his search, he was unable to find a suitable place to continue his business. It was only through the intercession of the press and the "Cepelia" association that Wozniak was assigned an apartment, which he swapped with another family in order to build a kiln in the garden belonging to the new apartment and resume his work. 

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Kazimierz Wozniak was an outstanding folk artist, but he never strove for popularity and extremely rarely presented his works in art competitions. He was recognized only twice. The first time was in 1978, in Torun, at the national competition "Polish Folk Pottery," where he received a special prize. The second time was in 1985, when he received the Oskar Kolberg Award for lifetime achievement in folk culture. About Wozniak's work, a documentary film was made in 1980. His works are in the collections of the Ethnographic Museum in Wroclaw, Warsaw, Cracow and Torun, as well as the Historical Museum in Sanok and many private collections, both at home and abroad. The Wroclaw museum has more than 100 of the artist's priceless vessels. 

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Kazimierz passed on his knowledge to his sons, mainly to Michal, who showed some artistic ability. Unfortunately, none of his children, despite their skills, continued the family tradition. Wozniak, who was declining in health, filled the kiln with dishes for the last time in the fall of 1982. He died on December 30, 1990 and was buried in Olawa's municipal cemetery on Zwierzyniecka Street. 

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 In 2021, almost 100 years after Kazimierz started his apprenticeship with Piotr Koszak, Kazimierz's great-grandson took over the family business and modernised the pottery workshop, where the old traditions are still cultivated and the techniques used by his ancestors are still in use. Our products represent over 200 years of passion, tradition and hard, arduous work. By choosing to join us, you make possible to pass on this extraordinary tradition to the next generation by protecting it from oblivion.