Bat Pendants From Stringing Magazine

In lieu of publishing the annual "Beads" magazine that showcased numerous new products in the bead industry, Interweave Press incorporated their top pics from submitted entries into their Fall 2012 Issue of Stringing Magazine.


You can grab a copy of this quarterly publication to see all the wonderful pieces they selected. My three bats were chosen to be part of the Ceramic Beads collection.

And here is some insight into how I make these (perfect time to post this seeing as how I need to replenish my stock of these for sale in my Etsy shop and website, and snapped some quick pics this afrernoon in my studio).


First I roll out the porcelain clay & then cut and texture the clay with my hand carved (and copyrighted - just FYI) texture plates. I use my own texture plates versus a commercially made textured stamps to give me some artistic rights.


I do use some commercial cutters. They are quite a great shape and size...


I like to "see" where the texture will be within the shape. I find that these pieces that i take the time to line up are much more visually attractive to me when they are glazed.


Sometimes a butterfly emerges during this process too.


The pieces are cut out, carefully removed from the cutter and laid flat on scrap pieces of drywall.


I just love all the textures...


Before and after receiving the preliminary holes.


Once these bats are dry enough to hold without bending or ruining the texture, I use a drill bit to make all the holes perfectly round and all the same size.


And all the scrap clay is sprayed down with water...


And put into a plastic bag until I am ready to use it again.

These textured disc beads were also sent in for consideration, but did not make it as they were only picking 1 of 3 submissions. Good thing too because actually - I had not quite gotten them to this happy stage with these yummy voluptuous side textures. They had been a bit of a weaker version that was just regular squished clay.


I like this updated version much better. These two sets are "Azul Copper" on top and "Sky Cowgirl" on the bottom. So my color palettes in my closet...

Let me know if you are looking for a bat in any particular color. I'll be working on glazing them next week for a shop update soon after.

http://www.MarshaNealStudio.Etsy.com
http://www.MarshaNealStudio.com

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