I approach what can only be described as a castle in the lovely hills just off West Dry Creek Road. It’s built of thick, grey stones with a bridge going over a circular koi pond. Also on the 56-acre property are an old gas station, a huge ceramic studio, a completely outfitted metal shop and a beautiful meditation room. Stained glass windows, handmade metal gates and railings and one-of-a-kind artwork pop out of the natural setting.
Robert Weiss, enamored of ceramics and crystalline glazes since he was a college student, is preparing for his twice-a-year ceramics studio sale. After growing up in Venice, California in a “tract of homes where every seventh house was the same,” Robert got his B.A. and his M.A. at Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles, majoring in sculpture and design with a ceramics focus. While still a student, he also taught ceramics and sculpture and started Robert Weiss Ceramics, which grew from a one-person shop to 100 employees in ten years, becoming the largest handmade stoneware facility in the country.
Robert’s motto has always been, “If I can do it myself, I will. And if I don’t know how, I’ll figure it out.”
“My dad worked at an alarm company and brought home different electronic devices that we’d play with as kids,” Robert says. “When I was ten, I built an electronic game with a maze attached to a board, wires going around the maze and a metal stylus which rang a bell when a wire got touched. My favorite book was ‘The Way Things Work.’ It’s all about how anything works, and I still have it.”
In 1967, while at Otis, Robert began experimenting with crystalline glazes to grow crystals of zinc and silicon on porcelain pottery. He spent three years formulating glazes––sleeping by the gas kiln to check the temperature every 15 minutes for two-day stretches. After three years, he’d created some fairly decent crystals, but today, with electric kilns and computers, he can hold a temperature within five degrees of the required 2350 degrees. He fires for 36 hours, checking the temperature on his smartphone app, but still gets up in the middle of the night.
Robert’s artistic drive and entrepreneurism have definitely shaped his life. While his ceramics company was expanding in L.A., a friend told him about Healdsburg. He came for a visit and fell in love with Sonoma County, Healdsburg in particular. In 1970, realtor Katherine Curtis showed him a large parcel on a dirt road off of West Dry Creek. At that time there was nothing, absolutely nothing on the dirt road, so he made up his own street number. Robert designed his dream home and, in 1972, began building it with the help of several craftsmen. He worked for 12 years.
When he first moved here, Robert purchased the old Miller Fruit Packing Warehouse at 55 West Grant for his ceramics facility. In 1980, when he sold his business, he kept the building and rented it out to Evans Designs for many years. His next endeavor was as owner of Joe Froggers in Santa Rosa. One night in 1982, while he was bartending, he met Patricia Brothers.
Patricia grew up in Tracy, CA. She attended private schools, hated them, and considers herself the “rebellious one” in her family of origin. She married at 19 and moved to Santa Rosa in 1976. After a breakup, she worked in the corporate world and enjoyed life. After meeting Robert, she moved into his home in Healdsburg and they raised three lovely daughters. Califa, born Alison, lives in Los Angeles and is a documentary filmmaker and entrepreneur who filmed and co-produced Healdsburger Tyler Erlendson’s film “Straight White Male.” Gwenivere (Gwen), born Jennifer, is a nutrition educator and chef. Ash (Ashley) lives in Santa Rosa and is currently assisting Robert in his studio.
In 1982 Robert sold his restaurant/bar, retired for a year and quickly got bored with tennis. His next enterprise was Global Tech, a company that sourced products from all around the world for U.S. companies. In 1984, Robert traveled for a month to various countries to meet representatives of companies with different technologies. Global Tech then developed a line of chemotherapy protection protects, which they manufactured in both China and Malaysia with Robert’s business partner, Derek Watts, from the UK.
Robert’s next venture was the development of inexpensive and highly nutritious fish foods through his company, AquaDine® Nutritional System, a subsidiary of NutraDine®, which manufactures custom pet supplements and treats.
AquaDine® also manufactures Salmalogs, a nutrient enrichment product developed for stream restoration and repatriation of Coho Salmon. Robert and marine biologist Bob Coey have studied four Sonoma County streams, convinced they will see vast improvement through their product––the goal being to remove Coho Salmon from the endangered species list (it’s already been enormously successful when used in Washington state).
Recently, Robert’s intense focus on developing crystalline glazes has been renewed at his home studio. He works regularly on his pottery with his apprentice Tre Vadnais and daughter Ash. As a resident artist with Healdsburg Center for the Arts, which he’s been involved with for over ten years, Robert exhibits ceramics and photography. He also exhibits his ceramics at Options in Healdsburg and throughout the state.
In 2012, Robert and Kirk and Pamela Demorest held the Healdsburg International Short Film Festival at the Raven Film Center. The event, sponsored in part by the Healdsburg Center for the Arts, was an enormously successful three-day event, which they hope to bring back in 2014. But Robert’s biggest love must be the Weiss Family Fine Arts Scholarship Fund.
“We’re just local now,” Robert tells me, “but we’ve given over 50 scholarships to Healdsburg High graduating seniors since 2002, and are looking to expand. All profits from the sales of my photography and ceramics are given to the fund, which allows seniors to attend college programs in fine arts and lets me give back to the community.”
Patricia handles the property, helping with Weiss Enterprises as well as designing things and caring for the home.
“We have a very close family,” she tells me. “Our daughters love hanging out with us, and even did when they were teenagers.
“I love things that feed your soul—crafting, walking, bird watching,” she adds.
Ash, upon hearing our conversation, remarks, “Mom’s more of a Zen master. She likes to keep it simple.”
Shonnie Brown is a local author and memoirist who is interested in fostering connections between people and their community. Shonnie writes personal and family histories through her business, Sonoma LifeStories, and is also a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. She can be reached by e-mail at [email protected] or on the web at www.sonomalifestories.com.
