Monday, April 1, 2013

Faux Fantasy Turquoise and an Exercise in Patience

Faux Carico Lake Turquoise Arrowhead Earrings

I have been trying to determine what my next tutorial will be about, and so I have been experimenting a lot.  First up:  Faux turquoise.  I LOVE turquoise, and wanted to try and come up with polymer versions of some of my favorite types of genuine turquoise, like Carico Lake and Blue Gem, neither of which I will ever be able to afford. 

Creating faux turquoise also satisfies my need for big, bold pendants and earrings.  I can create as big a focal as I want in polymer, whereas a piece as large in the genuine turquoise stone would be way out of my price range, and probably almost everyone else's price range, too.

I made more than 120 pieces in the last 10 days, and sanded so much, I'm out of commission because my fingers are a cracked and bloody mess. 

I am also out of clay, and it is torture!  I am very impatient to get back in the studio and do some Spring creating.

Faux Blue Gem Turquoise Pendant
I am seeing such beautiful new work from all my favorite polymer artists and I am jealous I can't get in there and create some new things, too.   

Until my fingers heal, I'm spending the time sorting finished pieces into three batches:  List, Trash and Butt Uglies.  If a piece passes the Diva Perfection Test, it goes in the List pile.  Pieces with imperfections go in the Butt Uglies Jar for my Momma.  Things I don't like or are too ugly for the Butt Uglies Jar get tossed.

Faux Carico Lake Turquoise Earrings

Of the 120+ pieces I created, I ended up with about 45 List pieces and 40 or so Butt Uglies.   The rest got tossed... a lot of wasted clay, unfortunately.

The next step is photographing and deciding which pieces to list first.  This is the hardest part for me.  There are only so many items you can fit on the first page of your Etsy shop, so I have to decide which are my favorites.

Diva Fantasy Turquoise Earrings

These are some of the pieces that made the cut and will be listed.  Seeing the final result is so worth the wrecked digits; and several of the pieces have already been reserved or sold.

Faux Blue Gem Turquoise Earrings

Which brings me to something I wanted to say.  If you see something in my Flickr photo stream that is not listed in my shop, ask me about it.  I only have the energy to post a few pieces at a time, so it may be that I just haven't gotten to the one you want yet.  I am always happy to reserve pieces for my loyal customers.  Email me and we'll discuss it, okay?

Thank you!



3 comments:

JuLee said...

As usual, you have done a spectacular job. I esp. like the mottled colors in your last set of earrings.

John (SC) said...

OoooooooH, I like these. Especially the Blue Gem and Carico. They have such a relaxing feeling about them. Something you could meditate on.
I know about the raw finger stuff. I wrap the sandpaper around a strip of Cello sponge to keep my fingers away from the sandpaper.
Hope they get better soon.
John(SC)

Becky Chisenhall said...

These are simply stunning, Lynda. Cannot help but hope these lovely pieces will result in new tutorial(s)!