Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

Hello :)

Today I want to show you how you can make a very simple but cool phone holder.

Materials:

air-dry or polymer clay
roller or pasta machine
clay shaping tools
small tube shape
water
acrylic paint
brushes

Instructions:

Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

Roll out your clay quite thickly and shape or cut it into a long rectangle.




On one end slightly bend it upwards at the edges, it should stay there if you didn't roll it out too thin. That is where your phone will sit.







Then bend the middle part upwards and use a tube shaped object (I used my small spray bottle) to hold the shape upwards.
A short part of the end can be bend in a 90° angle so that it lays flat on the work surface. This also supports the structure.
Smooth out any cracks or bumps with your fingers and water and let dry/ bake.




After it has hardened you can paint it in any colours you like or leave it like that. You can also cover it with ornaments or clay slices before baking.
If you want to create something similar to mine, first paint the whole phone holder white. Dab on the paint with a tissue to avoid brush strokes. Let dry and then paint on small flowers. Use the tip of your paint brush for this and make five or six strokes or dots. Once it's dry, use a toothpick and dipping it into yellow paint make dots in the middle of the flowers. I also made some larger dots with a skewer. You can also paint the underside light blue and create a small yellow boarder all around to match the flowers.


Glaze everything to protect it and you're done.

Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

UPDATE:

I wanted to add a picture of the phone holder in use for you :)

Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

I also made another one for a friend. I painted it with a longcat design haunting a skyline (It's a reference to Godzilla, so I painted Tokyo-like buildings).

Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

I drew out my design, scribbled on graphiite at the back to transfer it and then taped it to the clay phone holder. Then I drew over the lines again. The graphite on the back transfers the image.




However, you should probably paint the background first and then transfer it :D
Here a picture of the background and the first layer of paint on the cat.
I then painted the cat a light and a medium grey (for the shadow), outlined it in black with a very small paint brush, and painted the buildings black, too.


To paint the face I cut out my cat from the template, placed it on the painted cat body and transferred the face again.
I also covered the buildings with paper to protect everything and with a stiff paint brush sprayed on some white dots with my fingers to resemble stars.
Don't forget your varnish :)



Here a picture of the finished phone holder. I hope, he'll like it :)

Tutorial Clay Phone Holder

So what do you think? Do you like it? Let me know :)

See you soon

Tutorial Rose Notebook Cover and Pen

Hey there :)

Today I want to show you how I made this pretty notebook cover with red roses.
I made this for my best friend's birthday and now that I've given it to her, I can show it to you :)
It was a lot of work but I know that she can appreciate it and that she deserves it :)

Materials:

Polymer clay
Texture sheet (see tutorial)
Clay shaping tools
Roller or pasta machine
Small rose leaves
Bronze powder or eye shadow
Acrylic paint

Instructions:

Roll out a sheet of clay in your desired background colour (I used black) and texture it to give it interest. I used my home made leave texture sheet for this.

Now make the roses.
Roll out your red clay (or whatever colour you want your roses) very thinly. I used setting 6 on my pasta machine.
Cut out your petals in varying sizes using round cookie cutters or by hand.

For the fully blossomed roses I used four small petals, five medium sized ones and six big ones.
Flatten the edges of the petals and make sure, they don't look too even but more organic.
It's easiest to sculpt your flowers on a toothpick. Wrap your first smallest petal onto the toothpick and then attach one after another overlapping each with the previous one. Always make sure that the petals look organic and not to round and artificial.
Once you have added your petals pinch them once or twice to make them look a bit like they have folded themselves at those parts. Look at pictures of roses for reference.
If you have difficulties understanding my explanations check out this amazing rose tutorial by Maive Ferrando who explains it really well :)

For the small leaves at the bottom of the roses' heads that wrap around I rolled out a sheet of light green very thinly (pasta machine setting 6) and then drew on curvy zig-zag lines at the edge and cut them out. Flatten their edges to remove the sharp lines.

Wrap them around your roses and buds and smooth out the lower part. I also textured the leaves with my needle tool
Roll out little snakes of the same green and shape them into the stems. The top should be bigger as roses have a bulky green part underneath their heads (I think that's where the seeds are in) smooth out everything carefully with a silicone tool or whatever you have, always making sure not to crush the delicate leaves and petals. I left the stems a bit longer and cut them to size later.

For the buds and roses that are just opening up, use fewer and only the smaller petals.

For the main branch I mixed some shades of brown together without fully bending them together so they obtained a wooden texture. 

I rolled a thin and long log and placed it on my textured base. Don't make it look too straight.

The easiest way to get pretty and amazing leaves is to pick some real ones from your garden or wherever you can get them. I used a really small branch for this.
Remember that rose leaves usually come in branches which means there is more than one leave attached to the main stem, they are clusters of three, five or seven.
So I rolled out a darker green thinly and pressed my branch of leaves into it. You can roll over it with your rolling pin if you prefer but I find that the clay underneath sometimes gets distorted this way so that it doesn't have the right shape anymore.
I pressed my leaves in with my fingers and carefully rubbed over them. Remove it carefully, lifting one edge at a time, so that you don't destroy  the real leaves and that they can be used over and over again.
Cut out your clay leaves and then to create the jagged edges, use your knife and cut into the sides. Smooth the edges carefully with your fingers, so they don't look as cut out.

Of course you can also create your rose leaves without using real ones. Just cut out a leave shape and using a knife or a needle tool, draw in your veins.

Then think about where you want your flowers to go. I placed them on the base to try out my design and then took a picture of it to remember the placement. Keep in mind that smaller buds are usually at the end of the branches.
But before attaching them permanently you need to put down your leaves. So they're below the flowers later.

I rolled out some more of my light green I had used before into a very thin snake. From that I created the branches for the leaves by placing small snakes in the desired areas. Then I positioned the leaves using my real branch as a guide: One is always at the end of the branch and the others are parallel to each other. This way it's always an uneven number of leaves. Put the ends of your light green snakes onto the leaves and blend them together carefully with your tools. I also made sure that the leaves didn't lay completely flat but some parts always stuck upwards.

After having attached all your leaves it's time for the roses. Place them where you want them and cut their stems to size. Then blend the stems into the main branch. It wasn't easy to assemble the roses in a way that the cover wouldn't be too bulky. Especially as I wanted one to be looked at from its side. This simply got so fat that I had to cut it away after having baked everything already because you couldn't even open the book properly... So keep that in mind. I therefore, had to make a new one which I carefully pressed onto the base to flatten its underside without distorting the visible part... In order to do that I stuck my needle tool into its middle part and pushed down. It wasn't easy but it worked.

If you want you can dust on some shiny powder before baking to make it even prettier. I used my copper powder and applied it with my finger by carefully brushing over the surface. You can also use a shiny eyeshadow.
Then bake your cover. It's best to do that on a ceramic or glass tile so that it bakes completely smooth.
I also made a leave branch for the back of the notebook which I forgot to take a photo of.

I painted the whole cover and inside of the cover of the notebook black to match my clay piece and then glued on my creation. I also gave it a wash of thinned out black paint to go into all the low spots.

If you want you can give the sides of the book some shine, too. I took a golden pen and while pressing the sheets together tightly I painted over them. Be careful that no paint seeps onto the whole pages and that you don't have your pages stuck together. Therefore, you shouldn't use acrylic paint for this. Maybe you should try if it works with your supplies on an old notebook first.

Here the finished cover, look at the upper big rose, it's a different one than above ;)

For the pen I first folded a piece of metal into a tube for the refill to go in. I also used the refill as a guide for this. My metal is really thick so it's quite hard to do this and I need pliers for it.

Roll out a thick sheet of black clay and cut it to the length of your tube and refill, leaving out the tip of the refill.
Cover the tube in the black clay and smooth out the seams. Texture it by rolling it onto your texture sheet.

Put on some leaves like you did earlier and create a small rose to go on top of the pen. Also make some small leaves to go underneath the rose. Put the rose on top of the pen using liquid clay - if you have any - for stronger attachment.
Brush on the same powder as you used for the cover and bake it.

Glaze both your notebook and your pen with a couple of coats so everything is protected and shiny.

And that's it.

Difficult project but definitely worth it :)
Do you like it?

See you soon

Tutorial Jewellery Bowl

Hey everyone :)

Today I decided that I really needed one of those jewellery bowls or plates next to my bed to put my jewellery down when I go to sleep so it doesn't get knocked on the floor.
So I thought about a way to make my own and also include a ring holder.

Here is what I came up with:

Materials:

Air-dry or polymer clay
a lemon squeezer bowl with a hole in the bottom (see below)
clay tools
paint in the colours of your choice

Preparation:

Flower Jewellery Bowl

First I rolled out some clay (Air-dry clay to keep it cheap) to a large sheet. Try to make it as even as possible.








Then I drew a circle on the clay and divided it into more or less even five parts, as I wanted it to be a five-petal-flower. I then drew indents to make the petals and cut around it.















It's better to smooth out the rough edges to make it look softer.
With some water on my fingers I rubbed away my squiggly lines and then drew straight ones to separate the petals.

Flower Jewellery Bowl

Once I was happy with my basic flower shape I rolled a snake of clay, tapered it at one side and smushed the other side onto the table to make it flat. This will be the ring holder.
I put it in the middle of the flower which makes it look like a stem, too.


I blended in the stem with the flower with my plastic tool and then used my fingers and water to smoothen it out.

I drew the lines of the petals back in which got erased and then placed the piece onto my lemon squeezer.



My old lemon squeezer has a hole at the bottom which can help keep the ring holder in place while drying and the rounded shape of the bowl helps form my ring bowl.




So I placed my flower bowl carefully upside down onto the upside down lemon squeezer which I had on my lap as it couldn't stand upside down.
As the curve it created wasn't enough for my liking I placed some tissue paper underneath the clay to make the flower more rounded and corrected the shape a bit more using my fingers.



You then need to place the lemon squeezer with your clay on into a bowl or something, where it can't fall over and let it dry. The sculpting process only took me about 20 minutes.






If you're using polymer clay you probably won't need a lemon squeezer as you can make the ring bowl from two parts. Just put your flower upside down on a normal oven-safe bowl and bake. Then roll your ring holder, place it in the middle and bake again.


You can probably also create you own "bowl with a hole" by using a lot of tissue paper or newspaper and tape and creating a sort of paper ring to place your piece on.

Anyway, let your piece dry for a couple of hours and then carefully turn it around and let it dry on the other side. Mine dried for about 24 hours but it depends on your clay brand.

Only after it's fully hardened, you can start painting it in any colours you like. I chose red and yellow and kind of blended the colours together.
Then use some glaze to protect it and it's finished!

Flower Jewellery Bowl

Of course you don't have to make a flower, you can make a heart, a cat face, just round or square or anything you prefer.

Let me know, what you think of this idea and if you have any questions :)
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See you soon