Polymer Clay Etc.

27 videos, step by step, beginner cane workshop

What people are saying about this tutorial. jennifer rose Just finished this first workshop on how to make canes, and I must say I learned so much. This is exactly what I have been looking for, someone who could explain cane making in a step by step that process that I could replicate. I watched the videos, went into my studio and began to create all of the canes Alice showed. I finally have results I can be proud of, and I say thank you so much for doing this workshop. My only question now is when do we get more workshops. If you are only going to take one online class let it be this workshop. Thank you Alice for your hard work, and your dedication to helping others learn the joys of polymer clay.

Workshops for 2015 at 215

I was pleasantly surprised on New Years day to realize that 215 is going to be lucky numbers for me… 2015… Studio 215. I’m thinking good things are going to happen. I wish us all a happy, successful and productive 2015.

Just look at my class space set up with pasta machines, glass tiles, blades and tons of Polyform tools just waiting for you to come and play and learn. Kind of “leave your baggage at home”. Bring just what you need for that workshop and maybe your favorite blade.

Here are the workshops I’ve scheduled to teach at Studio 215 in January and February. Studio 215 – 215 North Ridgewood Dr. – Sebring, FL

The exciting news for those beginning in polymer, my Studio is fully stocked with pasta machines, glass cutting boards, blades, and all kinds of great Sculpey tools. I have all kinds of things for you experiment with so you can decide if polymer clay is for you before you invest. Or you may just want to come and make a project or two without having to own all the equipment. I’m also reserving one night a week as open Studio night with a small fee for those of you that have no place to work at home or just want to come clay with other enthused polymer people. no need to bring tools or equipment, just bring your project. Mondays will be open studio night beginning in April.

New! Introduction to Polymer Clay

Instructor Alice Stroppel

full day $75

Sat. Jan. 17 9am – 4pm

Sat. Jan 31 9am – 4pm

two evening – 3 1/2 hrs. $45 each class

Mon. & Tues. Jan. 19 & 20 6pm-9:30pm

Mon. & Tues. March 2 & 3 6pm-9:30pm

In this beginner’s workshop you’ll be able to work with polymer clay without the expense of buying all the tools and equipment needed for a successful experience. You’ll learn how to condition, cane, create and cure.

I’ll teach you how to make a Skinner blend and fill you in on some of the rich history of this incredibly versatile medium.

We’ll make a few basic beads and you’ll wear your new necklace home.

Building an Essential Cane Inventory

Instructor Alice Stroppel

one day $75

Sat. Jan. 24 9am – 4pm

Sat. March 14 9am – 4pm

Have you put off learning to cane because you believe it’s too hard, complicated, time consuming, precise, uses too much clay _______ fill in the blank? You not alone, but I can help.

If you like my style of work, I want to assure you that my canes are easy, fun and not at all precise. I don’t make large canes and I use every little bit of clay to make some interesting accent canes to use in all sorts of projects.

I firmly believe that you will be delighted at how much more creative and productive you’ll become if you have your cane inventory waiting for you when an idea hits. If you have to stop and make each component cane before you can begin, most times you won’t even start.

This class is for all levels of expertise, the only requirement is that you know how to make a Skinner blend and that you come to class with your Skinner blends and plugs already made. I’ll provide you with instructions ahead of time.

If you are a beginner, you should begin with my Introduction to Polymer Clay workshop or class before attending this workshop. Or teach yourself the basics online with the many free tutorials available.

Master Class

Instructor – Meisha Barbee

Mica Shift with Appliqué’ Pendant

Meisha Barbee is coming to Studio 215 in Sebring, FL and will be teaching surface design. You won’t want to miss this workshop.

In her own words, “On the first day, students will make an array of small canes in a pleasing color palette to be used in creating a finished pendant. This will include my Signature “Fractured” mica cane.

Students will be encouraged to bring their own personality to the work by applying their unique color and design sensibility. I will provide color consultation to those students who need it.

The second day of the class will be for constructing the pendant. I’m a firm believer that Good Design doesn’t have to be labored. I will share my simple construction and finishing techniques, so every student should go home with finished work they can be proud of.”

No Refunds given after two weeks before class date. Balance due two weeks before workshop begins.

To reserve your seat, contact me at alicestroppel@gmail.com

As a winner of the Niche Award in 2008 and finalist in 2011, Barbee has been recognized as a leader in her field. A member of the International Polymer Clay Association, as well as her local San Diego Guild,

“I’m inspired by good design. I spend my life seeing and responding to good design all around me. It’s just something I do naturally, so I think I’m tuned in to current trends without really trying. Color and design are my passion. I respond to the color and patterns of textiles, textures in nature and architecture, the harmonious balance of interior spaces, and so on. Good design is everywhere. I also appreciate and respect good craftsmanship. It speaks to the integrity of good design, and I always try to execute my designs with that in mind.” Meisha Barbee

$175

Sat. & Sun. – Feb. 21 & 22, 2015

9am – 4:30pm

PLUS – Syndee Holt in May and Randee Ketzel in June! Maureen Carlson in 2016! Amazing amount of fun coming. Stay tune for more information on these Workshops

Alice Stroppel’s Studio 215

Meisha Barbee Workshop at Studio 215

Master Class

Instructor – Meisha Barbee

Mica Shift with Appliqué’ Pendant

Meisha Barbee is coming to Studio 215 in Sebring, FL and will be teaching surface design. You won’t want to miss this workshop.

Students will be encouraged to bring their own personality to the work by applying their unique color and design sensibility. I will provide color consultation to those students who need it.

No Refunds given after two weeks before class date. Balance due two weeks before workshop begins.

To reserve your seat, contact me at alicestroppel@gmail.com

$175

Sat. & Sun. – Feb. 21 & 22, 2015

9am – 4:30pm

Min. 10 students – Max. 15 students

Alice Stroppel’s Studio 215

215 Ridgewood Dr.

mailing address – P.O. Box 4530

Sebring, FL 33870

for more information email

alicestroppel@gmail.com

Alice Stroppel’s Studio 215

Alice Stroppel’s
Studio 215
215 Ridgewood Dr.
Sebring, FL 33870

What a whirlwind! One month ago I purchased this wonderful building in Historic downtown Sebring, FL. It’s two blocks from where I grew up and so special to me because it belonged to my great friend Janet King and I hung out there loads of times in recent years.

I renovated the building inside and out. I’ve enjoyed having my studio at home and I will still be working there, but I wanted to spend more time teaching and sharing what I’ve learned about this incredible medium, polymer clay.

I will be featuring works by two of my favorite people, watercolor artists and Florida Watercolor Society Signature Members, Janet F. King and Alice Hansen.

I have a permanent fully stocked workshop space for 8 students and room to hold larger workshops for up to 16. Pasta Machines, tools, tiles, etc. I’ll be starting classes for both beginners and experienced polymer clayers in January. I will have everything you need to create your first pieces.

And more exciting news is that I will be hosting workshops with some of the talented polymer and multimedia artists in the country. Meisha Barbee and Laurie Prophater will be here teaching in February and Julie Eakes, master caner, will be here hanging out with us.

Meisha was my partner and made the first collaborative pendant with my Stroppel Cane that was featured on Polymer Clay Daily. An incredibly talented artist and colorist, you won’t want to miss this workshop.

Laurie has promised me an exciting class as well. Laurie is the owner of Ornamental Elements .com and has been featured in numerous magazines including Belle Armoire and Polymer Clay Cafe.

Two artists that inspired me in the early days of polymer are coming to Studio 215. Syndee Holt has promised to come teach a couple of workshops in May of this year. Syndee is a representative for Sculpey and has been featured in more articles and publications than I can mention here. She is the author of Polymer for the First Time.

Maureen Carlson will be here in 2016. Maureen is owner of Maureen Carlson’s Center for Creative Arts in Jordan, MN and has a long list of credits from TV to published books. Maureen has her own page on Amazon.

As you can see, I have great plans for Studio 215 and some surprises so stay tuned.

My posted hours will be Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 11:00am to 3:00pm. But that doesn’t mean I won’t be there most of the time teaching or working on my next big project.

I’ll be posting classes sometime next week but I can tell you now that I will be having open studio night every Monday from 6pm until 9:30pm, prices to be posted later. This will be a time for you to come and play and share and enjoy the company of other enthusiastic clayers.

Grand opening news to come.

Thanks so much everyone for your encouragement and kind words.

Black and White

I drew this woman on canvas last June with the idea that I was going to frame her, she has been patiently wanting to become something. I found this perfect wooden stool at a garage sale this week-end, painted it black and now my girl has a home. I have several other pieces I’ve been working on and will be sharing soon.

She is going to be for sale and I’ll be telling you more about that by the end of the week. I have some exciting news to share and can’t wait for it to happen. See you a a day or two or three.

Alice and the Caterpillar

*********************

‘One side will make you grow taller, and the other side will make you grow shorter.’

‘One side of what? The other side of what?’ thought Alice to herself.

‘Of the mushroom,’ said the Caterpillar, just as if she had asked it aloud; and in another moment it was out of sight.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

I’ve finally had time to working a bit more on my Alice in Wonderland tea set and I’ve added the caterpillar with his hookah. There are so many more characters I want to add to the set so I need to get busy.

The reason I’ve been too busy to work on Alice and her friends is that I took a trip to SanDiego to attend Sandy Camp (a well established polymer clay retreat) and to visit my friend Meisha Barbee. What fun I had and what a great group of clayers there are in California. More about that in my next post.

Character for this side?… maybe the Dormouse and the rabbit that was at the tea party.

If I Had a World of My Own

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn’t. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn’t be. And what it wouldn’t be, it would. You see?” Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

As you can see I’ve been working on Alice herself and here she is with the Mad Hatter. You’ll notice that I’ve moved the hatter and here’s why.

The other night after my post here and on Facebook, Ellen Prophater call me to share her thoughts on how to adhere my figures to the silver teapot. Thanks so much Ellen it’s nice to have a friend looking out for you. She suggested I use Genesis Artist Colors Thick Medium-Extender. She uses it all the time and with great success.

Oh course I have some, I bought it from her, naturally. Elleen and Sue Sutherland own Creative Journey Studio and carry almost everything you might want or need for claying. I’ve actually used it once or twice but didn’t really like the consistency of it and put it aside. But to be fair I didn’t use it long enough to really judge but it’s hard to spread.

And she’s right, super glue was not a good choice for this project so I popped the Hatter off the teapot and reattached him using Genesis, it worked very well. At least the bond is strong and solid.

Now you’re going to laugh, I had to tie the Hatter to the pot.

I told you that you were going to laugh.

Because of the dip in the teapot the Mad Hatter just didn’t want to stay in place. With Genesis on his back he just slid all around. It’s a problem I have with any liquid clay and with Genesis obviously.

Because he was already baked and solid I could tie him down, obviously this wouldn’t work with uncured clay. That leads me back to my post from yesterday where I talked about sculpting the Hatter about three weeks ago and he wasn’t very pliable, he was hard to fit to the shape of the tea pot.

Oh and I decided to move him to the right side of the teapot and like him there better so it all worked out.

Yesterday I sculpted Alice and placed her on the teapot right away while she was still soft. She stuck pretty well and didn’t move around when I baked her. I didn’t use the Genesis on Alice before baking because it’s thick and hard to spread, I didn’t want to mess up my sculpting efforts by push to hard.

She’s stuck to the teapot pretty well without anything but just the same I’ll pop her off and use Genesis before I bake the teapot again.

The flamingo makes me smile, being from Florida the flamingo is a favorite Alice Character of mine, not that there are any in my part of the state! Sandhill cranes yes, Flamingos no.

Here’s how the set is shaping up and you know that by the time I’m finish, I’ll have to add a few Alice crazy flowers. Thanks for following along.

Alice’s Wonderland Silver Tea Set.

I found this tea set while I was working on my silver pitcher, it was a really good deal at my local antique store. I mentioned in the silver pitcher post that I was working on something else and it was going to be fun. (for me at least) Well it’s been over a month since I started it and I’ve done oh so many other things since then. But I finally got back to it yesterday and I can see it is going to take me several months to finish it.

I’m labeling it my year long project. Alice in Wonderland tea/coffee set. I can already see that there are going to be challenges along the way. I have to remember that eventually the silver will tarnish and the pieces will have to be polish and rinsed. I’ll have to careful that the finishes don’t rub off and all the pieces are secure. It will be interesting I think, so follow me down the rabbit hole if you dare.

First of all I do not plan on using this tea/coffee set. I don’t think the clay would fair well, plus the insides of the tea and coffee pots are in the greatest shape. But most of all, I don’t serve tea and coffee with a silver service! Who knew? It’s going to be purely for display.

This was the first figure I sculpted. one of the Queen’s herald rabbits. I sculpted him right onto the handle of the creamer. There are going to be more things added to this piece, it’s not finished.

I’m notorious for jumping around so I jumped right to the Mad Hatter. I had a couple of problems with him and I’m still working on them. The first thing is that I sculpted him about three weeks ago and he’s just been sitting there. (lesson # one, if you begin it, finish it then) I put the finishing touches on him and placed him on the tea pot. Well, naturally he was not as pliable as when I first sculpted him and he didn’t want to conform. Sounds just like the Mad Hatter doesn’t it?

I placed him on the tea pot, supported his tea cup with a bit of polyfil and put him in the oven. When I brought him out of the oven, he had slid up on the pot. I placed a towel over him and gently moved him back into position and press him just as gently into place. Well…this works well for thinner pieces, but he’s thick and he cracked a bit along the middle, his head fell off (“off with their heads” said the Queen), plus I broke the tea cup off and it took his finger with it. No problem, glued the crack together, and glued his head back on.

Then I had fun adding color using markers, make up and my new fun coloring toy Inktense sticks. (water color in stick form)

I glued him to the tea pot (superglue Gel), I had to hold him in place while the glue dried, but he stayed put. Then I couldn’t find the little tea cup that had broken off so I made another cup and finger and attached it with TLS. I actually like this cup better so all’s good. I put the tea pot with the Mad Hatter back into the oven and baked again. Alice is going to go right next to him and the dormouse and the March Hare will probably end up on the other side. Lewis Carroll certainly liked rabbits I think. The White rabbit and the herald and the March Hare all appear in this adventure.

Next I have to cover him with TLS so that his finish won’t come off when it’s time to polish, then back into the oven again. Whew. We’ll see how that works.

So this is my adventure, I’m learning and have fun. I’ll post more as I progress, but don’t be surprise if other things get posted about in-between.

Sandy Camp and a New Scrap Technique

I have a lot to do this week. I’m very excited to tell you that I am going to Sandy Camp in California next month. I’m going to be doing a demo. Thanks so much to the San Diego Polymer Clay guild and Nancy Ulrich for letting me join everyone this year.

I’m very excited to get to spend some time with my buddy Meisha Barbee. After all she’s kind of responsible for me deciding that the Stroppel Cane was worth sharing. Remember our collaboration featured on Polymer Clay Daily? Fun!

I’m spending some time making girlfriend bracelets to take along with me plus some other goodies.

But in-between I’m using scrap to create some fun pieces. Jainnie Jenkins named them Scappy girls. Love that, thanks Jainne.

The hair and clothes are mostly from scraps. I textured them, cured them, then stained the whole piece. Mounted it on mat board and then framed them.

So many ideas too little time.

I have a big silver project I’m working on too this month and it doesn’t even include this pile of silver I brought home after a thrift shop adventure that put me into overload. *g*.

Wish me luck!

If you’re going to be at Sandy Camp, see you there.

Update – Polymer and Silver Upcycling at it’s Shiniest

I wanted to see what would happen when I cleaned the pitcher with silver polish. I really didn’t think there would be a problem. After all polymer is plastic and pretty sturdy.

It worked perfectly. The only thing I needed to do was use an old toothbrush to get the polish off the edge of the polymer. But hey, there was 50% less silver to polish! Fist pump.

The next thing I needed to address was the silver plate coming off the bottom. Since this is for me, I could have left it and no one would have ever noticed, but I believe you should finish every piece to the best of your ability. Just think about all the people that might see it someday. (yes I mean after I’m dead)

Plus the bottom was peeling pretty badly and I’m afraid it would have continued to peel. So I decided to add a border and cover the bottom.

I really didn’t like this, too busy, so I ended up with this extruded purple band.

But I never like to waste anything so on to the bottom the first try went. Still busy, but not seen but by a few. (me)

The plus is that it has sealed the bottom and will keep it from continuing to peel.

So now I can put my flowers back in it and enjoy. But first I need to sign it, you know, so all those people who will see it some day will wondered who the heck was Alice Stroppel. hehehe.

Polymer and Silver Upcycling at it’s Shiniest

I’ve been away on retreat and experimented with several things while I was away. I’ll post more about that as I finish up another project I’m working on, I’m excited about it.

Before I left on my retreat I picked up this silver plated pitcher at a thrift store. The inside has lost some of it’s finish but I think it could be polished up and still used. However, I already have a silver pitcher along with several other so I’m dedicating this one to flowers.

I covered parts of it with polymer clay leaving quite a bit of silver showing. I really like it and will be looking for more silver to pair with polymer.

A couple of years ago my husband asked me what I wanted for my birthday. I couldn’t think of a thing, then an idea came to me. I told him I would love flowers at least once a month and they didn’t have to be expensive.

So now at least once a month, sometimes more, I have a pretty bouquet of flowers to brighten my day. He doesn’t ever have to worry about a birthday present again. I feel loved and special. Win – Win!

Now a I have a dedicated vase just for my special flowers.

I can’t decide if I want to add more clay, I love the way the silver shines through. I decided to give it a day or two of looking at it from every angle and then make up my mind.

Can wait until you can see what I’m working on now…always fun.

Polymer Clay Etc.

Polymer Clay Canes for Beginners

Online Workshops with Alice Stroppel

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Workshops for 2015 at 215

Meisha Barbee Workshop at Studio 215

Alice Stroppel’s Studio 215

Black and White

Alice and the Caterpillar

If I Had a World of My Own

Alice’s Wonderland Silver Tea Set.

Sandy Camp and a New Scrap Technique

Update – Polymer and Silver Upcycling at it’s Shiniest

Polymer and Silver Upcycling at it’s Shiniest

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The Stroppel Cane

What is a Cane?

Polymer Clay Canes for Beginners

Online Workshops with Alice Stroppel

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Comments

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The Stroppel Cane

What is a Cane?