Gold RImmed Stamped Clay Bowls

I saw this blog over on pinterest for stamped clay bowls and really loved the idea, I also needed to make something for a belated mother's day present for when I head back to the UK in the Easter hols. So I thought this would be perfect. But in my normal haphazard style, mine are of course far from the perfection of Gathering Beauty's bowls. But I still love them and think my mother will too.

WHAT YOU NEED

Air Dry Clay

A Stamp of Some Kind (mine was a clear plastic one but you can use wooden mounted rubber ones too, they can also be any size, you will just need to stamp more).

Ink

Gold Cermamic Paint

Rolling Pin

Knife

Sandpaper

Paintbrush

White Spirit

First of all I made a mount for my stamp because I did not have one of those plastic blocks big enough, and I was trying to do this on the cheap.

You can see it here inked up and ready to go.

Then get a chunk of clay, knead it then roll it out until the desired thickness.

There are two ways of going about the next bit, either you can stamp the rolled out clay, or you can cut it to shape first then stamp it. I found doing it the first way (as the other blog did), meant that I had scraps of clay with ink on it, thus making it more or less useless to use again. So I decided it was better to cut it to size first.

So put a bowl over it that is the desired size and cut around with a knife.

Voila!

Now stamp it. Remember to ink up your stamp thoroughly each time and apply equal pressure.

You will then have a stamped disk, as you can see my ain't perfect (but it is part of the charm!)

Then press it carefully into a bowl. Do this evenly and gradually to avoid distorting the pattern.

Keep going until you use all your clay and all your bowls!

You then need to leave them to dry, I did this before work and by the time I came home (7 hours later in my very warm apartment) they were ready to turn out.

If you look carefully on this one you can see the rim is whiter where it is dry and the rest is still grey. It is not quite ready to be turned out.

This is how they looked when I left them to dry over night.

Once totally dry (about 24hours later) I gave them all a good sanding and evened out the rims as much as I felt like.

See, Much neater.

I then painted all their rims gold.

Some of them however had traces of blue ink on the bottom so I thought I would paint some of the bottoms gold too. Also as I am giving them as presents in sets of two, I thought this would make it more exciting!

Two coats later and I am done.

I am quite happy with how they turned out and will deff do this again. It was good fun and fairly cheap. And I think they look beautiful!

Next time I would like to get another stamp and colour to mix it up a bit. I nearly went with another colour because this is the same as the colour Gathering Beauty used, but its also the colour of my current bed and future bedroom AND my other choices of red or purple would not have been as appreciated by the intended recipients. Choosing another colour purely to be different seemed more daft than using the same! But if it had been just for me I would have done red for sure. 

Here is a pretty song

Experimenting with Colour and some Random Doodles

Like most creative people I seem to acquire odds and ends of all kinds, I have only been living here a couple of months but this workspace sort of organically grew of its own accord. It was just a desk with a printer on it when I moved in, but I find it hard to live anywhere without leaving my paw prints EVERYWHERE!

My workspace with the shelf I "made" from a piece of wood I found (with striped washi tape stuck to the side) and sat on books and vintage tins.

I have always been a doodler. As a teenager it was Manga cartoons (I was born in Tokyo and this was my way of connecting with that I think!), but of course this changed and mellowed out with age. I have dabbled a bit with watercolours, but mostly use promarkers and biros or fine liners for my drawings. But after watching a few videos on youtube about Distress Inks (which I use on my Etsy creations, see here), I decided that wonderful things must come if I start combining all three. So I started experimenting... Here are some of these experiments.

I have mixed feelings about this. Its a bit too yellow. But I was listening to a song, Psycho Cinderella by Soan and it made me think of mushrooms, not really clear why but it did. Here, have a listen...

Maybe it is all the singing about butterflies smoking that made me think of Alice. Who knows. But it seemed to make sense at the time. And it meant I could have a go at using distress inks for solid backgrounds as I really hate drawing on white, its so much more stressful than on a texture. I just sort of swiped the pads over it, threw some water at it and let it dry before drawing on top then painting. I used the markers a bit too... Was ok I guess.

This was the excess ink from the picture above, I used some paper to press over the top and pulled it away and was left with this, which I thought had beautiful potential...! It did!

This was done on one piece. I love how the ink shows through on her skirt and gives the background more interest. It was inspired by a picture by Saatchi, only I made her a red head because I am a little obsessed to say the least. Also she has no hands. I can't draw hands.

I started this too. This involved the gouache also. And some gold ceramic paint. It kinda moprhed....

Maybe it needs more something. I am not sure. But I like some of the ideas here. Like the dots texture in the top right hand corner. The top half gives me more ideas for sure.

Here is my new little friend. Inspired by a Supakitch tattoo. I have a bit of a love for Supakitch's art, I would love to have some in my room, this is the closest I get for now. The moon is water colour and the rest is promarker. I am actually thinking of having this printed onto a case for my phone. Anyone that knows me in real life will know how I have a tendency to personalize EVERYTHING. Whether it be my jacket, backpack or laptop... It all has a OrchidsHeart touch to it. 

I have plenty more sketches that are a WIP, and some older ones too.... Maybe I will share more at some point. We shall see.