Linda's Magic Workshop - Linda Britt Design

Leaves turning colors - Velvet covering on the young buck's antlers - Searching for that light weight jacket for walks - Enjoying cool night and early morning breezes - Visiting Flicker in the pine trees - he knows - It must be fall! And where did summer go? In keeping with that theme, this is my new seed pod I'm adding to my collection. The outer shell is made of copper metal clay and the pod is made of polymer clay.  It's fun to combine the two mediums.  Interested in the process?  Keep reading! If anyone has been following my FaceBook posts, you know I've been learning about and testing the temperatures of my new Paragon E12A kiln.  The interior temperature is not the same as the digital readout so I've been making my own chart.  While doing this testing I decided to make something from my clay instead of just strips and circles (I'm doing that too).  What better that a seedpod? The copper clay is Hadar's Friendly copper clay and it is...

Seedpods are a secret love of mine.  I collect them and many different kinds line my window sill.  I love to make them out of metal clay This bronze seedpod started out with bronze clay wrapped around a wax shape that was covered in saran wrap.   After the clay dried, I pulled out the wax through a hole I made for the bale.  The center seeds are thin steel circles that were placed over the bronze layer.  I painted veins on the sides and back with bronze slip (thinned bronze clay), sanded and let the piece dry.  The bronze clay was fired in activated charcoal in a 2 stage process and I always hold my breath when I remove a fired piece from the kiln several hours later.  Did the clay sinter (did it fuse into metal?)  or will I need to fire it again?  This time the clay did sinter except for one steel circle which got lost in the charcoal. After polishing my seedpod, I reviewed my choices.  I could leave th...