Future Tutorial: Controlled Mokume Gane and Faux Carving with Wonder Stamps

The latest among my two-sided polymer clay creations, this necklace was made using my hand-made Wander Stamps for polymer clay. 

I am in the process of writing a step-by-step tutorial that will explain how to use Wonder Stamps in Controlled Mokume Gane technique and in Faux Carving technique.  

Polymer Clay Pendant: Textures and Steampunk

Here is another two-sided polymer clay necklace.  

The pendant for this one has watch parts and resin on one side and various textures on another. 

If you want to make something similar for yourself, let me recommend my tutorials:

polymerclaytutorials.etsy.com

Two-Sided Polymer Clay Necklace

I want to show the necklace I just made for myself.  It has design on both sides – one of those ideas that make you wonder why you have not thought of it before.  It makes perfect sense, right?  Shaping and stringing each component takes a lot of time and effort, so why not double the return by making both sides of the necklace work. 

For this particular piece, I made one side with crackle technique and another with my Fantastic Filigree technique. 

To make the crackled surface, I rolled a very thin layer of polymer clay on a ceramic tile and briefly heated it with a heat gun.  As a result, the very top layer of the clay was cured, leaving the rest of it still in its raw form.  When the raw clay was expended by rolling my heat-treated polymer sheet through a pasta machine, the crackles appeared.  I cut out the parts for my two-sided necklace elements, baked them, and treated the crackled surface with some white acrylic paint to make the texture more visible. 

These necklace elements were finished with hand-made antique bronze frames and covered with two-part epoxy resin to give them nice and smooth finish.  The frames were made in the same way as described in my tutorial “Polymer Clay Pendants with Sterling Silver Frames”.  The tips and tricks for using epoxy resin for polymer clay jewelry are explained in my other tutorial, “How to Work with Two-Part Epoxy Resin”. 

Fantastic Filigree technique (used for the other side of the necklace) is described in a tutorial with the same name.  Al three of these tutorials can be found on my website, polymerclaytutorials.etsy.com.

How to Choose Jewelry

Making jewelry is very popular among polymer clay artists, which makes us part-time jewelry stylists.  If not helping our clients with choosing the best earrings and necklaces, we are faced with the same questions for ourselves.

On a number of occasions I've heard polymer clay artists saying that they do not wear jewelry at all because nothing seems to look good on them (this is usually said with a sad sigh).  I am pretty sure that there is the right jewelry for every woman in every outfit (except when she is dressing for work-out, hiking, or some similar activity, to be exact).

Anyway, having polymer clay with its endless possibilities for creating any color, texture, or shape, enables us to come up with the perfect jewelry piece for any occasion while all other mere mortals have to hunt it down in shops, boutiques, and on-line.  There is only one question: what to make?

To answer this question, I want to share a very informative post from Imogen Lamport's blog Inside Out Style.  Imogen is a Melbourne (Australia) based blogger and internationally certified image consultant.  Her blog is packed with fashion and style information for real women.  Enjoy!

Click on the image to proceed to Imogen's post "How to Choose Necklaces"

New Polymer Clay Necklace

Tide Pools, Statement Polymer Clay Necklace

Done! 

I am very happy with the way my new organic polymer clay necklace turned out.  Not only is it pretty (if I may say so myself), but it is also surprisingly comfortable to wear.  I will have to write a separate post to brag about the construction of this necklace.  For now, let's just admire my new creation.

Tide Pools, Statement Polymer Clay Necklace

The biggest polymer clay element is made using my openwork technique.  The flat green element is textured (stamped) with a round metal finding.  The brightest red one is a polymer clay disk with holes shaped over a domed form and backed with a flat disk. The remaining four are made using the techniques described in my Sea Creatures tutorial.  All elements were made out of yellow polymer clay and colored with acrylic paints and alcohol inks.  This process is also covered in my Sea Creatures tutorial.

Tide Pools, Statement Polymer Clay Necklace

New Necklace - Work In Progress

I am working on a new polymer clay necklace combining my Openwork Pendants and Sea Creatures techniques.

I think I will name it Tide Pools.

Here are a few (not all yet) elements for this future necklace.   I am so excited to see how it is turning out.  So many textures, patterns, colors, and yet it should all work together.

To give you an idea of the size of these elements, here is the biggest one in my hand:

I am a bit intimidated by the construction stage.  The design I have in mind is quite complex and unusual.  I hope I have enough engineering skills  to actually make it happen...