I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve been crushing hard on the terracotta, white and black look lately. It’s a combo I would have totally balked at in the past (my initial thoughts would have been ‘what, brown? really? ewww’) but I’ve been so swayed by ceramics designers like Sharon Muir that I just had to try out this mix for myself.
I thought I’d start small and make myself some jewellery to begin with, then branch out into clay bowls or other homewares if I liked the look. And you know what? I think I like the look!
Materials
- Air dry terracotta clay
- Rolling pin or glass bottle
- Craft knife
- White acrylic paint
- Paint brush
- Black acrylic paint pen
- Painter’s tape
- Varnish
- Earring posts
- Butterfly backs
- Super glue or strong craft glue like E6000
Step 1
Roll out your clay until it’s a few millimetres thick.
Step 2
Cut out shapes for your earrings. I made pair of bar earrings and a pair of square ones, but you can make any shapes you like!
Once your shapes have been cut out, leave the clay to air dry.
Step 3
Mark off a section of each earring with painter’s tape, and then paint the untaped part white.
Step 4
Using an acrylic paint pen, start drawing in patterns on your earrings. I kept my patterns to simple shapes and lines.
Step 5
Give your earrings a coat of varnish to protect the paintwork and clay.
Step 6
Affix the earring backs to your clay earrings using super glue or E6000.
I haven’t really ventured into making jewellery much, or making anything with clay that isn’t white for that matter. But now that I’ve finished this project, I think I’m going to have to play with terracotta clay a little more – it’s pretty nice paired with black and white and I can totally imagine making larger homewares using this combo.
Have a go and let me know what you think – I’d love to hear about your terracotta craft adventures!
xx Steph