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I thought it was about time I returned with a polymer clay tutorial so I’m sneaking back in with this colourful and super easy flower slab made primarily with a polymer clay extruder.
For anyone interested in where I disappeared to, I was asked to make some classes for Creative Fabrica for them to add to their online tutorials. I made two polymer clay classes and two bead weaving classes. It was a really exciting opportunity and one that I absolutely couldn’t turn down.
In between filming the tutorials I managed to dislocate my shoulder on my dominant side. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you how painful that was and it slowed me down so much. It is still painful now, 7 weeks on, but thankfully not as bad as it was.
Back to this flower slab, I added accents of silver leaf to the clay before adding the flower shapes as I wanted to make sure that the space between the flowers had some interest. If you use silver foil you will need to seal your finished jewellery with either a varnish or resin to avoid it being scraped off.
The joy of this polymer clay slab is that the clay extruder does a lot of the work in helping to build the flowers. The finished flowers actually reminded me of pansies. I have based the tutorial around the basic set of discs that comes with a basic Makins clay extruder.
As ever, altering the colours will give different results and adding as much or as little detail to your slab will ensure unique jewellery.
How To Create A Polymer Clay Extruder Slab
1. Condition your clay colours really well so that they are easier to pass through the extruder. I have used lilac, purple, magenta and yellow. You will need more lilac than any other colour as this will also be used as the base clay for the slab.
2. Roll out some of the lilac clay on a number 3 on your clay machine or to just a few mm thick if you are rolling by hand. Add little pieces of silver foil on the surface of the clay.
3. Find the two extruder discs that look like three petal flowers. They should be two different sizes. Pass the lilac clay through the smaller one and the purple and magenta clay, one at a time, through the disc with the larger shape.
4. Cut thin slices of the purple clay and lay this on the sheet of prepared lilac clay. Using an acrylic roller, roll the clay so that the purple shapes are flat. There are several more layers of clay to add so rolling it between layers will ensure it doesn’t get too thick.
5. Cut thin slices of the magenta clay and position this on top of the dark purple clay. Rotate the magenta shapes so the three petals of purple clay are visible.
6. Roll over the magenta clay so it lays flat on the slab.
7. Cut thin slices of the lilac clay now and position this on top of the magenta clay. Again, rotate the lilac clay so that all three petals of the magenta is visible.
8. Roll the clay again to flatten the lilac pieces. This doesn’t have to be totally flat.
9. Using a pointed tool add some detail to your petals. Do as little or as much as you like but I love to add details to flower petals.
10. Add little dots of yellow to the centre of the flowers and use a ball tool to texturize them.
11. I continued to add more detail to my slab by adding little dots of yellow clay in-between the the extruder flowers. I also used a small dotting too to add little dots in the clay. The slab is now ready to cut!
I love how fun the finished pieces are with the bold flowers and flashes of silver leaf.
Links below for products used are Affiliate links for Amazon (UK and United States). This just means that if you use my link to buy a product I earn a very small commission, at no extra expense to you (you pay the same regardless how you find the item). Every little extra helps me to offer free tutorials.
Affiliate Links –
UK
Fimo Lilac, purple, magenta and yellow
USA
I hope you have enjoyed this little tutorial. It may be an easy slab but the finished pieces are very striking and look anything but easy!
Hannah x
The Artisan Duck 