About the Cat Pottery

Moorside Design, in the village of West Burton, Wensleydale is the family run business of Shirley and Barrie Nichols and daughter Sarah who have been designing and making ceramic cats since 1982 and since the 90's  designing metallic and stone garden cats as well.

Shirley and Sarah both studied sculpture, Sarah at Edinburgh College of Art and Shirley at Leeds and the Slade School of Fine Art, University College, London. With a combined 11 years of professional training plus many years of practising the art and craft of the sculptor, the Moorside Cat is instantly recognizable as one of the better examples of cat sculpture.

Our family cats Chloe,Orlando,Zoe,Tilda, Millie and.since July 2007, Ruby have been the inspiration behind the sculptures upon which all the ceramic,metallic and stone cats are based. Our cats are not modelled in abstract or geometric forms, nor are they caricatures. They are lifelike and demandingly tactile as Orlando, the stone cat at the entrance demonstrates, having achieved the smooth patina of a much stroked cat. Below is Zoe confronting Orlando.She never dared to do this in real life. Tilda and Millie and Zoe have now passed away joining Chloe and Orlando in their resting place in the Garth. We now (2009) have two new rescue kittens Alfie and Sophie who will continue the line of models started in 1982 by Chloe, the doyen of them all