Monthly Archive for July, 2008

McGlon’s hot sellers

Jenn McGlon is an painter/illustrator/collage artist and creator of funky polymer clay art…women birds, cakes, houses and polka dots…meant to make you smile.

Her line of small houses, Luettes, are wildly popular on Etsy and she does a brisk business in commissioned sculptures.

The best way to view her art is to look at the sold items in her Etsy gallery. Her style is young and optimistic and her sculptures perfectly mirror her drawings. Look out, there are many links on her site that you may find hard to resist. I had to explore her music too.

Lombardi’s polymer bouquets

Italy’s Marina Lombardi’s (Ali di Libellula) polymer clay creations are perfect for a summertime Monday. She bases her designs on floral illustrations and adds wire to simulate climbing vines and tendrils, often adding pearls and stones.

Her wire work style is unusual and distinctive and the combined effect is that of a lush old-fashioned bouquet.

My Italian translation didn’t give me much insight into how she acheived her effects. You’ll have to draw your own conclusions. Enjoy her flowery Italian summer palettes.

Solly’s faux lampwork

The use of colored liquid polymer clay is growing in popularity. North Carolina’s Sharon Solly’s faux lampwork beads shown here and yesterday’s multi-layered pendants by Lesya Binkin are tempting me to give it a try.

Sharon’s been perfecting her liquid clay techniques and shares some of her secrets (fantasy cabochons) in the June issue of Polymer Cafe magazine. Her faux lampwork is a promising new twist.

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Binkin’s new fashions

When we looked at Israel’s Lesya Binkin a while back (here), she was creating pendants made of multilayers of liquid polymer, metal leaf and embedded items.

In her most recent work, she transfers laser prints of her densely patterned illustrations (she started out as a fashion designer) to polymer, embellishing them with layers of sparkle and a glossy coat. This wise use of her illustrations gives her a new line for the season.

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Tips from Klew

I resurrected this video shot last year to remind myself to take better care of my best polymer clay tools - my hands. We’re lucky to have many talented masseuses like Klew in our ranks to keep us healthier.

For the life of me, I can’t make my thumb joint pop like Klew does on Sarah Shriver. The instruction is good anyway and I’m paying better attention. (Grasshoppers were making that annoying background noise.) Here’s the full-size version.

On a sillier note, I made myself a very attractive (and much younger) avatar/manga at this Italian site. Perhaps I should make a cane of it. The site’s in Italian but with a little clicking around, it’s easy to get the hang of it and email the results to yourself. I found it on Samyii’s Flickr site.

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Mabray’s tricks

I need a little good fortune today and a little time off for my wrist which brings me to Angela Mabray, CraftyGoat, and her polymer clay fortune cookie.

Angela’s site has pages and pages of tips and tricks to keep you entertained and educated. (She used a pumice stone for the realistic texture on this cookie.) She’s especially good at repurposing kitchen tools and at organizational tricks. If you’re breezing through, go to her Flickr stream you’ll get the gist from her great pictures.

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Wiggins mixes her media

No better way to start the week than with snappy, crisp, snazzy polymer clay designs from Angie Wiggins. Angie ventures into metal, fiber, glass and found objects but she can’t resist the lure of polymer. Polymer clay "solves my intense color needs," she admits.

"I was taught to embroider at the age of five. I have been a detail freak ever since," Angie reveals. Her jewelry, platters, and containers sing with color and will get your week humming.

The link is from Ronna Weltman. Many thanks.

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Code fixed

Discovered that one of my statistics-gathering widgets was bogging down the page load time. Things should be smoother now and I’m doing a little code-monkey dance.