Clay pot shapes

One English edition is Smith, Trey; Paul, Alex: Around the Tao in 80 Days. 2009. The title alludes to the famous book of Jules Verne and also to the 81(!) Chapters of the Dao De Jing.

The book authored by Smith and Paul is a nice translation and introduction. It stays on a middle path between the trivial on one hand and excessive pensiveness on the other.

Chapter 11 is entitled by the editors

Much Ado About Nothing:

We join spokes together in a wheel, but is the center hole that makes the wagon move.

We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness inside that holds whatever we want.

We hammer wood for a house, but is the inner space that makes it livable.

We work with being, but non-being is what we use.

Translation due to Stephen Mitchell.

Putting in parallel the verses of your post one recognizes three well known, concrete examples illustrating the general, but abstract claim in the end.

Concerning the interpretation of the abstract claim the editors quote the following interpretation of Marc Watts:

The strategic advantage of recognizing the value of space is not only practical, however, because the bowl, representing space, is also a metaphor for the vessel of consciousness, and what is true of a ceramic bowl is also true of the mind - it works best when empty.