air dry clay Archives - The Salty Knitter

I just made this gorgeous one of a kind wall art from air dry clay and I could not possibly be more pleased with myself! I don’t know what it says about my character, but for me the season’s must-have are always my least desired. So making something unique to hang on my wall is pretty exciting for me.

It all started from my efforts to make clay succulents.

Like this one I ruined with paint. Is it flower or succulent? You decide.

Materials:

Air Dry Clay in Terracotta. I used Sculpey’s Polyform Model Air, a 2.2lb brick of it was $17.99 at Michaels in Canada.
Foil – to make drying forms.
Rolling Pin
Crochet hooks or sculpting tools.
Leaf or Petal shaped cutters.
A frame – mine was from a second-hand shop, at $6.99 a bit more expensive than usual but it had that MCM flair to it.
Heavy cardboard or similar
Permanent glue such as crazy glue or glue gun.

How I made it:

From trial and error, I figured out that a foil ring was the perfect way to support my clay petals/leaves while they dried. Without it, they sag until they’re flat again.

I cut all of my petals with the wider cutter. I just trimmed them shorter as I got closer to the center of the flower.

After cutting out the petals, I flip them and use a moistened crochet hook to smooth away the crumbly parts the cutter leaves behind and to add texture. It’s easiest to smooth and texture a few at a time, they need to dry a bit before handling them because the water makes them slimy.

Starting at the outside of my clay dot, I add the petals one layer at a time. Pinching the tip of them gives some shape.

Once it’s done, I pop it in the oven at 170 to dry.

Painting the flowers:

After the clay succulent, I learned my lesson. Once you paint air dry clay, you can’t take it back.

So I made some test pieces to try different colors before committing to another mistake. The slab was a piece I rolled out but couldn’t use – an untended table does not remain cat hair free.

The chalks give a nice soft all over color on the slab, but did not work very well on the shaped pieces. The leaf dry-brushed white with a magenta tip is interesting but the finished flowers have so many spots that can’t be reached with a brush, I decided to just dry brush white on my flowers. I used the light turquoise color to paint the boards I glued the flowers to.

I intentionally made the flowers a little larger than the frame opening, so I put the boards in first, then glued the flowers in place.

I’m impressed at how well this wall art turned out.

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I’ve been obsessed with the idea of making faux succulents lately, and it has been the most frustrating project I’ve ever tried.

There are a few tutorials out there for making succulents with felt, paper, pinecones (I love those) and even one with duct tape, but nothing for clay. But there are a lot of tutorials for making roses using cold porcelain clay.

Thinking I could use the rose technique, I made not just one, but three failed batches of home-made cold porcelain clay. The first batch was too dry, the second batch was to lumpy and the third batch was too sticky. Feeling like Goldilocks and the three bears, I tossed it all and went to Michael’s. That tells you how obsessed I was with making faux succulents, because I despise shopping.

Once I got home, I realized I grabbed the terracotta color instead of white. Now understand that I live with 2 dogs and a very insistent cat. It is a sad fact of my life that any time I’m elbow deep in a task, one of them will want to go out, or come in, or be fed, or whatever, and I had failed at this project for three days in a row. Three days of very sticky, messy discouraging failure. Three days of having my hands covered in sticky goo while the cat hung from my window screens to come in.

I was so frustrated I went to bed to watch YouTube videos, and found this one.

At least I had an idea of how to get started now.

Faux Succulent Materials:

Please note, some of the links below are affiliate links. Should you make a purchase through one of these links, you still pay exactly the same price but I make a small commission on the sale.

Package of air dry clay – I used Sculpey’s Polyform Model Air (in terracotta)
Leaf shaped cutters in two sizes – you can buy a kit for fondant that has multiple leaf shapes, or make them like in the video. There are a good selection to choose from >>here<<
Tools for sculpting – I used knitting and crochet needles but there are kits available.
Wax paper or plastic wrap
rolling-pin
a small bowl of water

Making the Faux Succulent

I made my leaf cutters from an old circle cutter. One is narrower than the other, to get different lengths just trim the cut leaves. My table is very old and stains easily, so I rolled out my clay on waxed paper and cut out a bunch of the larger leaves. I covered the clay I wasn’t using with waxed paper, and anytime I left my project I covered it as well.

I flipped all the cut leaves to the bottom side and used a moistened crochet hook to smooth away the crumbly edges the cutters left.

I started out using the moistened crochet hook to ‘shape’ the leaves, trying to give them a scooped out look, but I liked this textured effect instead. Water makes the clay slimy and hard to handle. I found it easiest to prepare a bunch of leaves and wait for the slime to disappear before trying to shape and attach them.

You can see the first two layers in place. I used pieces of drinking straw and clay to keep the curves shaped into the leaves. Otherwise the weight of the clay made them sag and flatten out.

I continued adding layers, pinching the tips of the leaves to cup them.

Here it is, finished and ready to dry. After nearly an entire week of failure, I wanted it done so I dried it in the oven set at its lowest temperature – 170.

And there it is, dried.

Paint it or leave it:

After so many fails at this project already, I should have left my faux succulent bare. Instead I tried painting it. Big mistake!

I attempted the Blue Mountain Pottery look but it didn’t work. I wish I had just lightly dry brushed the light turquoise color on the bare clay instead. Next time, I’ll know better!

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