R.F. Outen Pottery, Matthews

The R.F. Outen Pottery is a historic industrial facility at 430 Jefferson Street in Matthews, North Carolina. The roughly 1.5-acre property includes a brick kiln, and a concrete-block workshop, both built about 1952 by Rufus Outen. Abutting the workshop to the north is a metal roofed and sided shed, in which Outen stored clay. Outen, trained by his father at the Matthews Pottery, produced utilitarian folk pottery on these premises until his retirement in 1976. The facility is a well-preserved example of a complete mid-20th century folk pottery works. ()