“A lot of work and love goes into this.” I’m talking to Desert Sun Ceramics owner Liz Ford about the November 8th event known to Moabites as the “Soup Bowl Fundraiser and Silent Auction”, now going into its 7th season.

For locals and Folk Fest aficionados it’s a place to choose your own hand-crafted soup bowl and fill it with a unique soup dinner in between Folk Fest events. For Our Village Community Center, Moab’s “intergenerational community-building orchard” out on 500 West, it’s a valued fundraiser that could net the nonprofit a cool $15,000.

Each year, CLAM, aka Clay Artisans of Moab, creates the soup bowl event and chooses a different Moab nonprofit to gift with the proceeds.

“It is a true labor of love, involving hundreds of hours,” Samantha Derbyshire, the event’s planner in chief, tells me, echoing Ford. Derbyshire took over the reins in 2023. We’re talking about generating nearly 500 pieces of pottery at Desert Sun, as well as major organizing to coordinate the restaurants, markets and other local donors who supply the soup, bread and desserts for the event, as well as the many volunteers who show up to help out.

The challenge Derbyshire faced was to streamline operations, lessen the workload, and more clearly hone in on the values involved in putting on a complex and intensely popular, fast-growing event so the organizers don’t burn out.

Now in her second year, she is optimistic – “We get a lot of people helping – we’ve been growing and generating quite a bit of money…”

Moab’s Youth Garden Project helps out by opening up their commercial kitchen and making it available to soup-makers. And Desert Sun Ceramics offers up their ample work space, incorporating “throwing nights” and classes with the making of the indispensable bowls. And when asked what would be truly helpful to the event’s continuity and longevity, long time local and pottery maker Abigail Taylor exclaims: “Join CLAM and become a potter. We welcome more people to carry that load – and it’s lots of fun…. Winter is a great time to get involved!”

To find out more, check out the Desert Sun Ceramics website and mark your calendars for the 8th of November - $30 Tickets are on sale at Back of Beyond Books, Canyonlands Copy Center, the Desert Sun Ceramics studio on S. 191, and Our Village. The event is held at the Moab Arts & Recreation Center (MARC) downtown - Doors open at 4 p.m. and tickets are sold there for $35. An ever-changing theater of soup and soup bowls is served up 4:30 to 6:30.

“A lot of work and love goes into this.” I’m talking to Desert Sun Ceramics owner Liz Ford about the November 8th event known to Moabites as the “Soup Bowl Fundraiser and Silent Auction”, now going into its 7th season.

For locals and Folk Fest aficionados it’s a place to choose your own hand-crafted soup bowl and fill it with a unique soup dinner in between Folk Fest events. For Our Village Community Center, Moab’s “intergenerational community-building orchard” out on 500 West, it’s a valued fundraiser that could net the nonprofit a cool $15,000.

Each year, CLAM, aka Clay Artisans of Moab, creates the soup bowl event and chooses a different Moab nonprofit to gift with the proceeds.

“It is a true labor of love, involving hundreds of hours,” Samantha Derbyshire, the event’s planner in chief, tells me, echoing Ford. Derbyshire took over the reins in 2023. We’re talking about generating nearly 500 pieces of pottery at Desert Sun, as well as major organizing to coordinate the restaurants, markets and other local donors who supply the soup, bread and desserts for the event, as well as the many volunteers who show up to help out.

The challenge Derbyshire faced was to streamline operations, lessen the workload, and more clearly hone in on the values involved in putting on a complex and intensely popular, fast-growing event so the organizers don’t burn out.

Now in her second year, she is optimistic – “We get a lot of people helping – we’ve been growing and generating quite a bit of money…”

Moab’s Youth Garden Project helps out by opening up their commercial kitchen and making it available to soup-makers. And Desert Sun Ceramics offers up their ample work space, incorporating “throwing nights” and classes with the making of the indispensable bowls. And when asked what would be truly helpful to the event’s continuity and longevity, long time local and pottery maker Abigail Taylor exclaims: “Join CLAM and become a potter. We welcome more people to carry that load – and it’s lots of fun…. Winter is a great time to get involved!”

To find out more, check out the Desert Sun Ceramics website and mark your calendars for the 8th of November - $30 Tickets are on sale at Back of Beyond Books, Canyonlands Copy Center, the Desert Sun Ceramics studio on S. 191, and Our Village. The event is held at the Moab Arts & Recreation Center (MARC) downtown - Doors open at 4 p.m. and tickets are sold there for $35. An ever-changing theater of soup and soup bowls is served up 4:30 to 6:30.