Discover a world of creative and colourful jewellery making from the comfort of your own home.
In this comprehensive guide to modern polymer clay techniques, artist and designer Heidi Helyard reveals the simple techniques that can be used to create one-off, contemporary jewellery pieces with minimal tools and equipment.
Polymer clay is possibly one of the most accessible yet versatile art materials currently available. As readily accessible and easy to use as paint, you can make everything (and anything) with it, from sculptures and figurines, to artworks, decorations, homewares, and wearable jewellery. It's lightweight, flexible and strong. No special tools or equipment is required to cure it, it is relatively cheap, and you only need to start with the primary colours, plus black and white, to mix any colour you like.
Polymer clay, which has been around for nearly 80 years, is currently finding itself popular amongst contemporary jewellery makers as the bright colours and sheer versatility of the material allows makers to create bold and graphic modern designs.
The beauty of polymer clay is that it presents so many opportunities to explore colour combinations, patterns and texture. In this book you will learn 10 easy yet exciting techniques including slab and cane making, marbling and colour mixing, inlay techniques, printing onto clay, surface embellishments and more to create 20 unique jewellery pieces.
The projects in this book vary in complexity, but are accessible to both novice and advanced makers alike. If you are a beginner, the extensive step-by-step photos and instructions will help you develop your polymer clay skills and complete the projects with confidence. As you build your skills and learn the techniques via the book, you will realise that you can combine techniques to create all-new results.
The skills you learn in this book will open up a limitless world of further experimentation for you to discover.
Just make, bake and wear!
Heidi Helyard is a self-employed graphic designer living on the beautiful Central Coast, in NSW, North of Sydney.
As a creative artist, she has worked with embroidery, weaving, and other fibre art for years. In 2017, as part of her quest for texture, She started incorporating polymer clay into her fibre art pieces. This evolved into incorporating fibre into her polymer clay pieces! Small wall hangings morphed into wearable pendants, then came earrings and other jewellery-related objects. The progression was very organic.
She considers her jewellery collections to be small-scaled, one-off pieces of wearable art. The fact that each piece is unduplicated and unique is really important to her. Each pendant, earring or bowl is a limited edition - collectable and precious, completely individual piece, and the polar opposite of the mass produced fashion jewellery flooding the market. It is important to her that her pieces be instantly recognisable as a Heidi Helyard piece.
For Heidi, it’s all about colour and texture! The beauty of polymer clay is that it presents her so much opportunity to explore endless colour combinations, patterns and textures.
