May 19, 2008
Making Polymer Clay Molds - Inspiration From the Sea
A beautiful mold for polymer clay can be made using real seashells:
A cool trend I've noticed lately in polymer clay circles is the use of shells and sea shore finds as shapes to create molds for making polymer clay beads.
One very beautiful example of this idea is from Heather Powers of the Craftgossip Blog and Humblebeads. She uses sea urchin shells for making molds.
I'm guessing she must have made the mold in two parts to make a complete sea urchin bead, but whatever she has done they are gorgeous! I also think she probably used an acrylic paint as an antique finish to get that wonderful, realistic chalky look!
You can make your own polymer clay molds by pressing sea shells or other objects into a lump of raw clay and then baking the clay to harden the form. Remember to use a release agent like water or cornstarch on your shell to keep it from sticking. After your mold is baked, dust with cornstarch or spray the mold with water and press raw clay into your mold to form a bead. Don't ever bake your raw clay right in the polymer clay mold, or they will bond together.
In a future post I will give you more details about how to make polymer clay molds, so stayed tuned. Meanwhile, give it a shot on your own and "sea" what you can come up with!
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Filed under 05: Techniques, 12: Inspiration, 14: Feature Guests by Cindy Lietz
Comments on Making Polymer Clay Molds - Inspiration From the Sea »
Shells aren't the only thing that make great molds. Buttons, small sculptures, leaves, keys or anything else that can leave an impression in clay can be used too. Experiment and let me know what you've made.
Cindy's last blog post..7 Tips To Avoid Leaving Finger Prints on Polymer Clay Beads
Try Tina Holden, beadcomber, she uses chalk to weather her beads and she has 2 free tutorials on her site
Thanks for the tip chanelle!
I checked out Tina's blog and she has some excellent info there. She also makes some really beautiful purple urchin beads with hollow backs that are worth checking out! I like her use of chalk for antiquing and will have to give that a try.
As luck would have it, I ended up winning one of Heather's Urchin beads in a comment contest at Art Bead Scene.
The back of the bead is actually flat, so it was made in a one part mold not a two part like I thought. Also the antiquing was done with oil paint and not Acrylic.
The surface is fairly smooth rather than bumpy and is quite a bit smaller than I expected, though if I would have looked at the measurements I would have known better. The bead looks very textured so I think it was possibly sanded after coating with paint to show the texture that was hidden by paint.
It is a neat looking bead with the signature Humblebead 'natural' look and will be fun to make some wonderful jewelry with!
Cindy's last blog post..Polymer Clay Treasure Hunt Contest - Win a Bead Making Course
Hi Cindy, guess you know already I love the site! I was wondering if you could help me with a little project. I want to make a set of Icehouse pieces (looneylabs.com/whybuy/treehouse.html) from polymer clay. They have to have specific dimensions and it would be nice if they were nestable/stackable like the plastic pieces.
I have a plastic set that I could use to create moulds from, but my problem is how to stop the raw clay pieces from getting distorted before/during baking.
Any ideas?
Thanks! Anna…xxx
Hi Anna, yeah I guessed you liked it around here! :-)
If you make a molds you could try making one for the outside and one for the inside. bake them and then make your piece from new raw clay. To keep the pyramid from distorting you could bake it in the mold but you would definitely need to use lots of cornstarch between the mold and the raw clay so it will come off the mold later.
Alternatively, you could make triangles from sheets of clay and glue them together into pyramids after they were baked, which I think may be a lot easier. You'll have to play around with it a bit.
Let me know what you come up with. I'd love to hear!
Thanks Cindy! I think I'll try both methods and see which works best for me.
And I'll let you know how it goes!
A…xxx