Polymer clay is widely used in the manufacture of designer jewelry and small souvenirs. Its properties allow you to create miniature products with the finest details. It can be produced colorless or painted in different colors. In addition, sometimes special substances are added to polymer clay to give products transparency, metallic sheen or pearlescent stains. Some of its species can glow in the dark.
Distinguish between self-hardening and thermoset (baked) polymer clay. The first loses its plastic properties at room temperature during the day, the second - at a temperature of over 100 degrees Celsius for 15-30 minutes. Products made of polymer clay after hardening or baking in a special oven or oven (at home) can be painted in the desired color, and, if necessary, to connect their individual parts with glue.
To work with this material you will need special tools. This is, first of all, a work surface. It should be made of glass or plastic, the use of a wooden surface is undesirable. If possible, it is better to buy a modeling board in a specialized store. A mini-rolling pin made of glass or metal will make it easier to knead clay (you can use improvised materials, for example, a piece of kitchen railing). You will also need cutting tools of different sizes to cut pieces of clay from a bar or trim curly parts. Ideally, you should buy a special set of blades to work with this material: polymer clay does not like blunt kitchen or penknives. To prevent parts from wrinkling, to cut off or trim them you need only a very sharp blade.
To make holes in clay, for example, in the manufacture of beads, it is necessary to have an awl, a thick needle or knitting needles of several sizes. Finished beads can also be baked on wire. Those who manufacture beads professionally acquire special forms. To create curly “dents” (for example, in the manufacture of flowers), beads of various sizes, worn on toothpicks, are useful (you can use hairpins with beads). In professional sets, their role is played by single- and double-sided metal dots with wooden or plastic handles. You can buy ready-made forms for ready-made volumetric impressions - children love to work with them, while adults are usually more interested in creating their own figurines, author's. To trim the edges, curly scissors or cutters are used.
In addition to blades, professional tool kits include extruders - original syringes with curly nozzles, through which you can squeeze “sausages” of the required size and configuration, silicone brushes to smooth the surface of products, dots with balls of various diameters, curly curbs, as well as stacks with smooth or embossed ends. However, according to the masters themselves, they rarely use all the items in the sets. Therefore, there is no special sense for a beginner to buy such a set: working with polymer clay at the initial stage does not require complicated devices.
As for the technique of working with this material, in addition to the usual sculpting, masters use some specific techniques. These include, for example, a sugar technique in which prepared beads are rolled in sugar or small salt before baking. The hardened beads are washed in water until the grains are completely dissolved. A relief pattern remains on their surface.
A technique called millefiori (from it. “A thousand flowers”) allows you to create beads with an interesting multicolor pattern. At the same time, multi-colored whetstones are assembled into one "sausage" in accordance with the author's plan - so that a certain pattern is formed on the cut. They can not be pulled out and rolled up - only gently squeeze along the entire length. The “sausage” is compressed in this way to the desired diameter and it is given the intended shape so that when it is cut, round, triangular or oval details are obtained.
Gathering symmetrically together the details made in this way, or laying them out on one surface, one obtains products in the kaleidoscope technique. Cut the “sausage” for it to be as thin as possible, just a few millimeters. An interesting effect is provided by the so-called filigree - the finest technique in which tiny pieces of polymer clay that mimic the threads are combined into complex patterns. For such works, polymer clay with a metallic effect is best suited.
When working with this material, certain safety precautions should be observed. So, baked clay when exceeding the permissible temperature of +130 degrees, releases a toxic substance - hydrogen chloride. According to some experts, self-hardening polymer clay, when working with it, releases harmful substances - the result of a reaction that ends with its hardening. However, according to the assurances of the manufacturers of this material, polymer-based clay is absolutely safe, however, when working with it, the instructions should be strictly followed.
In general, the question of what polymer clay can be answered as follows: it is a beautiful, bright and easy-to-use material that allows you to realize the most daring creative ideas for creating designer jewelry and voluminous miniatures.