Robin's Egg Necklace

These beads are leftovers from a ceramics experiment with minty glaze...now reborn as a robin's egg necklace!

Shabby Chic 3D Model

 I made a half-inch scale shabby chic bedroom! 

 It started with hours of Pinterest surfing and leafing through Rachel Ashwell books.

 Then I gathered scraps of fabric, paper, wood, and other such decorative tidbits. 

I work very spontaneously on projects like this. For example, I was hurrying past a recycling bucket after sawing some trim for a window sill, noticed a shred of ripped corrugated cardboard out of the corner of my eye, thought, "Ooo, fluting!" and scooped it up in one fluid motion to go turn it into columns.

The walls and base are foam core with printed images of floral and mint planks as wallpaper and hardwood.

There is a doily rug and a rack of dresses. I made the rack using skewers, paint, and hot glue, and the dresses are lengths of ribbon glued to gold wire. The mannequin is a chunk of trim with a screw topped with a clay body and a rhinestone.

The headboard is a piece of foam core I embellished with paper clay and gold paint, and the footboard is a piece of trim I cut and painted. The mattress is foam core covered in fabric, lace, and velvet. All the pillows are stuffed with cotton balls. The mirror is from Michael's, the art is reduced printouts on cardboard (including these thrifted roses), and the drapes are actually remnants of an IKEA curtain.

The back of the chaise is a wooden cutout of wings. The little bust by the window is made of clay.

The armoire (or desk? or piano?) is a piece of molding with chopstick legs and clay and paint embellishments to match the headboard. Plaster roses make a good wall decoration. Little did I know, as a frustrated toddler, that the fabric roses I ripped off my shirts would end up in a model bouquet several years later.

I also gave the model a high tin tile ceiling with a chandelier made of seed beads, floral wire, plastic beads, and upholstery tacks.

 It is a flickering battery-operated tea light so it makes the room look all cozy! 

Flower Crown Bust Vase

I love the elegance of classical busts so I made one out of clay, except this bust is also a vase. 

After I hollowed out the head I added braids with strategically placed holes. Flower stems can be slipped in the holes to make it look like the bust is wearing a flower crown...to take it from elegant to whimsical.

I glazed the inside of the fired bust with clear glaze and the outside with snow white glaze.

Once it was fired again I filled it with flowers for an unexpectedly pretty display!

Clay

These are the first things I have ever made out of clay--a pedestal, doily tray, beads, and (quelle surprise) roses. Now I am totally in love with the medium!

There were a few cracks in the edges of the tray after it was fired so I filled them with plaster and then painted the whole thing white.

The "Robin's Egg Green" glaze took me a while to find, since I didn't expect it to be pink!

On the roses I used clear glaze, although I was similarly surprised when I opened the container.

The glaze on the pedestal makes it look like a chocolate chip cake--an unintentionally cute result!

The tray is going to display some of my jewellery so I gave it a gold rim.

I made these into robin's egg beads to use for a necklace or bracelet.

I will use the white roses to decorate my shelves, and the pink ones will be used as pendants.