C ERAMICA was always ill-conceived and poorly executed. It's still hard to understand why a pottery exhibition was built close to two of the foremost ceramic museums in the world. It smacked of politicians giving Burslem something to appease those lobbying for investment in the town. It's hard to know which was the more naïve: the original projection that it would attract 100,000 visitors annually (a prediction reduced to 20,000 by the time the Millennium project finally opened in 2003), or the then trade and industry secretary Stephen Byers predicting that Ceramica and the Great British Kitchen scheme in Stafford would be cornerstones of local economic regeneration.

B ut that is in the past. Attracting around 11,000 visitors a year and propped up by council taxpayers, the city authority has commissioned a report into Ceramica's future. It is, incidentally, very surprising that the report's authors have not spoken to the trustees running Ceramica in drafting their recommendations. It appears there are two proposals: invest enough money to make a genuine, profitable attraction, or move the exhibits and rent the space out for commercial use. We would argue in favour of massive investment in Ceramica, if – and it's an essential caveat – its content can be differentiated from other Stoke-on-Trent attractions so that it complements rather than imitates them. There is still massive potential to turn the city into a 'ceramic Ironbridge', providing a lucrative tourist trail from Gladstone to Burslem via the Potteries Museum (and maybe including the Spode site too). There is a big opportunity here, but do we have the ability to grasp it?