Slip (ceramics)

Engobe, from the French word for slip, is a related term for a liquid suspension of clays and flux, in addition to fillers and other materials.

[3][4] Engobes are commonly used in the ceramic industry, typically to mask the appearance of the underlying clay body.

This allows a higher solids content to be used, or allows a fluid to be produced with a minimal amount of water so that drying shrinkage is minimised, which is important during slipcasting.

Slipware is pottery decorated by slip placed onto a wet or leather-hard clay body surface by dipping, painting or splashing.

Slip decoration is an ancient technique in Chinese pottery also, used to cover whole vessels over 4,000 years ago.

African red slip ware : moulded Mithras slaying the bull, 400 ± 50 AD.
Charger with Charles II in the Boscobel Oak , English, c. 1685. The plate's diameter is 43 cm; such large plates, for display rather than use, take slip-trailing to an extreme, building up lattices of thick trails of slip.
Chinese porcelain sugar bowl with combed, slip-marbled decoration, c. 1795