 |
| Feelin' Groovy covered bottle 6" tall, each side is about 2 1/2" wide |
I have been collecting cool glass jars and bottles for awhile now and when this challenge came up I decided it was a good time to start to upcycle some of them and give them a new life. I had so many I liked, mmm which to choose?
 |
| Stash of glass to cover |
I really like the rosy and blue bottles (saki bottles) but I don't think I want to use much clay on those because they are so beautiful by themselves. For this challenge the object had to be at least 50% polymer clay so they were not going to work. I finally decided on a balsamic vinegar bottle from Trader Joe's.
 |
| Trader Joe's balsamic vinegar bottle |
I decided to combine two techniques I recently learned from the Polymer Clay Adventure series. The techniques involved "Cane Mutiny" with Teresa Pandora Salgado and "Polymer Painting" with Suzanne Ivester. I love the organic work of Salgado's cane work. Freedom to stretch, twist, is so much fun. From Ivester I learned how to slice your "canvas" and place what you want where you want it. Then flatten to a smooth painterly look. So I started by making some cool organic canes.
 |
| In progress |
Once the canes were made I sliced them in varying thicknesses. Some very thick ones I flattened with the pasta machine and ended up with a very large "pedal" to make big "flowers" as a base. I put these words in quotes, because these are strictly my "pedals" and "flowers" all made up! When I wanted to add a smaller shape over the larger one, I would simply carve the shape of the smaller shape out of the larger one and fill the gap with the new shape - as in polymer painting. I kept doing this repeatedly on all sides, sometimes layering four and fives times to get the organic look I was after.
I made two tops for the bottle, the one shown in the first photo is mounted on a cork, the top pictured below is all polymer clay.
 |
| Second top made from all polymer clay |
More side views:
 |
| Showing both tops |
This bottle and other similar items are available in my shop StrebeDesigns.
Thank you so much for stopping by and sharing my story. I would love to hear your comments.
