Experimenting With Copper Clay

Well today I thought might like to join me in a little experiment.

The beauty of the internet means that I have a constant source of inspiration available so there are always new ideas to try out; today I’m working on producing bead caps in metal clay and I’ll be sharing with you how it goes over the next two blogs.

I should probably mention at his point that I can’t draw, at all, for some reason I simply cannot convey what I see in my mind onto paper in any way that is recognisable or even useful so I just skip over that part, dive into the making process and make lots of notes.  So there will be no sketches or concepts for you to see at the start of a project, I will do my best to explain what I’m trying to achieve and hopefully imagination will supply the rest.

Because clay starts to dry the minute it encounters air I like to have everything laid out close to hand before I start and as you can see from the picture you really don’t need much in the way of tools. First of all let’s talk about the clay I’m going to use; Hadar’s Clay ™ Quick Fire Copper, this comes in a powdered form so I can just mix up what I need for that day, the rest will keep almost indefinitely in the plastic jar (the beauty of this product is there is virtually no waste, if you make a mistake just dry the clay out thoroughly, grind it back to powder and start again).

The trick with mixing up the clay is to add just enough water for it to start to bind but still feel reasonably dry to the touch – a bit like making pastry really – the clay will actually come together nicely when you roll it out.   You’ll notice that I use a plastic wallet for rolling out the clay, I originally started doing this because I have four cats and no matter how much you clean and hoover clay is a magnet for pet hairs! I roll the mixed clay a couple of times to make sure it’s thoroughly mixed and then roll it to the required depth (playing cards are great for this I have pairs of them taped together in 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 deep).  For the first set of caps I have simply transferred the rolled clay onto a hard surface and used the cutter to give me the shape I want. If you want to make caps for beads then you may as well use beads as a drying form, in this case some rather nice large japer ones. I’ve used a knitting needle to lightly press channel in between each petal tip for a little interest, the shape can be finalised when they are dry.

For the second set I’m going to press a decorative plate into the surface of the clay, I’ve used quite a shallow pattern as the pieces are so small so it will be interesting to see the effect when it is fired. It can be quite a fiddly job lifting and piercing the caps then easing them into shape on the bead so I like to cove the clay with a damp piece of kitchen towel to stop it drying out while I work.

Next stop is tidying up the edges and sanding the surfaces, it’s a lot easier to shape and sand clay so do as much of the finishing as you can at this stage. Dried clay is brittle and will snap but with a little care you can do some really fine detail work on it, use water and clay slip to fill and smooth any cracks in the work.  The really important thing now is to ensure that the piece is completely dry; any moisture in the clay when firing will nearly always end in disaster causing cracks and breakages. Pop the pieces onto a clean piece of glass or mirror for a few minutes, if there is any misting on the glass there is still moisture in the pieces. I have a warming plate that I use because I need to dry a number of pieces as quickly as possible, that said, it is on the lowest setting with the pieces on a rack about eight inches above it. It’s the warm air circulating it not the direct heat that dries the piece safely.

Well that’s about it for the first part – next up Firing and Finishing.

Metal Clay – More Than Just Play-Doh

Strange title for a blog you might think, well yes, probably, but ‘Play Doh’ was a term that I heard applied to Metal Clay when I first encountered it a few years ago, mainly from purists in jewellery industry who saw it as nothing more than a passing fad – not worth taking the time to research. Well time has proven what a wonderful and versatile product it is and I, for one, am hooked!

What is Metal Clay?

Well in simple terms it is a combination of very fine particles of precious metals such as Silver, Gold and Platinum mixed with an organic binder (in this case the clay) and water.  From a UK prospective the first major developments in metal clay were undertaken by Mitsubishi (yes the car manufacturers’) in the early 1990’s.  Their product was to become known as PMC, and was for a while was the only avenue for this remarkable product in this country.

Metal clay was slow to make a major impact on the jewellery trade here in the UK with people not understanding its potential or finding it too fiddly and time consuming to be profitable. The price in the early days was prohibitive; demand for the product wasn’t high, with very few suppliers in the UK and little competition to bring prices down. With the American jewellery makers’ leading the way the product has become more popular and you can now work in:  Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, Bronze and Steel.

So how does it work?

This is not a lesson on how to use metal clay in fine detail, merely an introduction to what you can achieve with this most remarkable of mediums.

Firstly you need to remember that while the finished item is precious metal the main component during construction is clay, any restriction you have initially will be dictated by that medium first and foremost, so forget you are a metal smith and become a potter. 

You can buy the clay in lump form of various weights, in a syringe or as a very fine sheet and you can use one or all of these to make your piece.  Because clay is the dominant material you can manipulate it in a variety of ways. It can be rolled, moulded and stamped, you can add texture to all or parts of it and it can be built up in layers to produce interesting effects. The picture below shows a clasp that I made with one side fired and ready for polishing and the other side still in the ‘dry’ state waiting for final sanding and finishing before being assembled prior to firing.

The Platinum, Gold and Silver versions can be fired with a hand torch in what is a relatively quick process if you don’t have a kiln; however, until recently the copper and bronze versions required a very long 2 stage process involving activated charcoal.  They have now introduced quick fire versions in both mediums which has made them accessible to a wider range of crafts people.

Metal clays are never going to replace the traditional metalsmiths’ techniques and nor should they.  My hope is that they will become accepted as another way of stimulating people’s imagination into different areas and ultimately giving us one more avenue to be creative with.  Just to whet your appetite to the possibilities - this is what I produced from my first experiments with copper clay, finished and ready to be fired - they sold within a week!