As a teenager, she worked for the Ford Motor Company and studied fashion illustrating at night in Detroit, Michigan. While visiting an artist's studio in Detroit she saw a wheel-thrown pot and remembers thinking “This is very exciting!” She met and married Robert “Gus” Thorburn and the couple moved to Ann Arbor where Gus studied architecture at the University of Michigan. The Ann Arbor Potter's Guild gave Joan an opportunity to develop her interest in clay, and it was here that she first met and studied with Rhoda Lopez, a well-respected Michigan potter and Cranbrook alumnus. “To me it was very exciting, because we would make our own clay. We would knead it - mix it all together and knead it - and then throw the pot. So you made the whole thing!” Joan recalls.
In 1958, after 3 years in Ann Arbor, Gus and Joan moved to San Diego with another couple, Joe and Marlene Gerber. Joe was also an architect, and everyone packed up and drove cross-country together. Gas for the odyssey cost $24.00.

Arriving in San Diego, they first lived in a boarding house near Balboa Park and then in Mission Hills and Gus was employed by architect Lloyd Ruocco. Before long, Joan got in touch with Rhoda Lopez, who had also moved to San Diego to join the faculty of the Art Center School in La Jolla. Again, Joan took classes with Rhoda, this time at the Art Center. The two potters became close friends and eventually traveled to Europe together.

Dorothy Moore Scott and Kay Thomas shared a studio in the Spanish Village since 1958 that became the San Diego Potter's Guild. Joan joined the group shortly after the guild was organized and was told that in the beginning members sold candy to keep afloat, but not many pots. But by this time the guild was growing fast, with talented members like Betty Newkirk, Marvell Stickney, Jean Balmer, Lily Stoddard and Bill and Portia Bowne. New members were given a one-person show.