Sorcha, Raku is low-fired and still porous. Given the right glaze you could use it -- I know a few functional raku potters -- the best, a guy down in FL named Ken Jenson.

Rapaire, we call those "room temperature glazes".

John, There's a few well-known wood kilns in my area. Probably the best-know is the ceramics professor at Notre Dame -- Bill Kremer's huge kiln. I attended a firing there last Spring.

And down in Thorntown there are two brothers -- Jeff and Tom Unzinger -- who are making some of the finest wood-fired pottery in the country today.

It is a LOT of work.