I was lucky enough to attend Polydays a brilliant 3 days of polymer clay workshops in the beautiful Cotswolds organised by Alison Gallant just over a week ago. It was a wonderful weekend full of polymer clay, good food and good company. The teachers were all fantastic and taught us a wide range of skills. We were lucky to have polymer clay provided by both Polyform and Decoman for the workshops – thank you both! On the first day we had a...

Earlier this year I took part  Brit Hammers excellent Photographing Fine Art and Craft Guided Study Course. I have mentioned the course in some of my other blog posts this year and hopefully, especially  if you have been following my blog for a while, you will noticed the improvement in my photographs!  It was a very intense and very rewarding experience which I have reviewed in detail in an article published recently in the Fall issue of The...

I wrote a tutorial for Premo!Sculpey and it was on their website, unfortunately now there is only the materials list. You can however find the tutorial on my website here. There are step by step instructions which show you how to make the cane and then the beads and also these cute little tile earrings. Even if you aren’t interested in making them yourself you might find it an interesting insight into my creative process. If you do have a...

I was very excited (as I am sure half the polymer clay community was!) this week when Polymer Clay Daily featured Artybecca’s Hollow paper forms. Rebecca kindly shared some templates on her blog and I couldn’t wait to try it out. The first couple of beads I covered with scrap clay, my intention to cover them with cane slices. Whilst trying to decide what kind of cane to decorate them with I was playing with the thought of  making...

A fellow polymer clay artist was asking about glue for brooch backs the other day and it got me thinking. What happens to the superglue I use when the piece goes in the oven?  My normal procedure for adding a brooch back is to superglue it in place then cover it in a decorative layer of polymer clay and cure the piece again. Here’s a sample back   I use the super glue to hold it in place whilst I am working and I know the polymer...

I was lucky enough to be able to attend the wonderful Highland Fling Polymer Clay workshop that Melanie Muir hosted in Nairn last weekend. It was a luxurious 4 days of polymer clay play lead by the very talented Melanie West and Ronna Sarvas Weltman. They were both very generous teachers sharing lots of their tip and tricks. The rest of the group was made up of a very international group of clay addicts and we had a lot of fun! Melanie Muir was...