Polymer Clay Jewelry: Learn 10 Beads & Charms

Class Preview

In this class from our partners at Interweave, Christi Friesen gives you 10 reasons to love polymer clay for making beads and charms! From intricate marbling and cane-making to sparkly surface effects and more, Christi takes you through 10 totally unique and creative techniques for amazing jewelry. Embellish your clay pieces with mica powders, gold leaf, foils and Swarovski crystals. Experiment with molds and carving. Before you’re done, you’ll know exactly how to bake your pieces, apply after-effects and add findings to create jewelry that’s purely you.

Welcome

Christi welcomes you to this exciting workshop on creating beads and charms with polymer clay.

Meet Christi Friesen

Learn about Christi, her artistic inspirations, and her love of polymer clay and mixed media.

Tools & Materials

Learn the basics for getting started with polymer clay, plus some fun extra tools to try!

First Things First

Learn how to condition, blend, and store your clay.

Marbled Beads

Wadding, squashing, flattening, ripping, tearing, stacking! Believe it or not, that’s exactly how you wind up with an amazing marbled bead. Watch as Christi shows you all the best tricks for creating breathtaking swirled patterns. Embrace the chaos, or guide the patterns into a more controlled look.

Cane-Patterned Beads

Making a cane allows your patterns to be more precise, intricate, and uniform than those produced by marbling.

Mokumé Gané Beads

Meaning “wood grain metal,” traditional mokumé gané is a technique used by master metalsmiths in 16th- and 17th-century Japan for sword-making. The stunning patterns produced by this method have inspired polymer clay artists to adapt the technique to a new medium. Get ready to expose beautiful patterns by cutting away stacked layers of clay!

Foiled Pathwork Beads

There is so much you can do with foils and metal leaf! Foils come in a rainbow of colors. Metal leaf is golden in color, but not real gold. Both embellishments crackle easily, making for an exciting look.

Sgraffito & Swarovski With Gold Leaf

Bring on the 24-karat gold leaf to do some fancy sgraffito work! Real gold leaf works better than imitation for this technique, and it elevates your work to a more serious level. You’ll also embellish your beads with Swarovski crystals for some extra shine.

Faux Facet Beads

For this fun technique, you’ll be playing with Sculpey UltraLight, a type of polymer clay that is, well, ultralight. This porous product carves nicely once baked and it absorbs color well. Christi shows you how to take advantage of both of these features to make these beautiful gems.

Totally Tubular Beads

“Totally tubular” describes these beads perfectly, both literally and figuratively! This unique method has all kinds of adaptations, as you’ll see in this lesson.

Embellished Beads

Beads embellished with even more beads or glass rhinestone crystals? Oh, yes! Armed with Christi’s tips, you’re well on your way to creating these flamboyant beauties.

Impress-Me Beads

Two-part mold-making material gives you the power to garnish your clay beads and charms with adornments from your own molds! Christi is a fountain of information on the possibilities that await you.

Sculptural Leaf Charms

Last but certainly not least, these leaf charms give you ample opportunity to experiment with sculpting, texturing, and shading. Sculptural clay is a huge world in itself, so this project will give you just a taste.

Baking

Bake your beauties to perfection with Christi’s guidance!

After-Effects

Once your clay is baked, you may wish to apply after-effects. Christi goes over glaze options.

Putting It All Together

Add head pins and other findings to turn your pieces into jewelry.

Design Tour

Christi’s design tour will pump pure creativity through your veins! Follow Christi as she shows you how you can combine techniques to come up with fabulous creations.