Create & Craft TV

I really enjoyed my last show on Create & Craft TV. It was all about shrink plastic jewellery making and I had a lovely time colouring and shrinking with the wonderful and very witty Nigel May. he could sell sand to the Arabs, he's so enthusiastic about whatever he does!

I enjoyed demonstrating some new pieces including a zebra print pendant. It was quite large, so when I shrank it with the heat gun the sides stuck together, this isn't great live on air but there's always a way round it! If this happens to you, then let the piece cool slightly then pull apart the sides that have stuck together. You will hear a little popping sound. Don't worry if the plastic looks too contorted, just put the heat gun back over it and it will flatten down and straighten out beautifully.

I'm back on Create & Craft again on Sunday 21st March with Shrink Plastic Jewellery at 9am, followed by Silver Clay Jewellery Making at 12pm.

Crystal Clear Butterfly Pendant

Here's a butterfly pendant I made using the crystal clear shrink plastic. It's the perfect medium for the butterfly as you want to see the design on both sides of the wings. I love the way you can manipulate the plastic as it's cooling down. I pinched the wings in different directions to give it a more organic look and then added silver wire for the antenae.

Some Shrink Plastic Creations

Here are some of the things I've made with shrink plastic for my show on Create & Craft TV. I hope you like them, they're very simple and were extremely good fun to make!

Which Shrink Plastic Shall I Use?

When you first start out it's a bit confusing about which type of shrink plastic to use as it comes in so many different colours, sizes and designs.

The brand I use is 'Shrinkles' this brand is excellent, shrinks down beautifully and doesn't need any sanding. It comes in lots of different varieties and here's how I use them:

Crystal Clear
Perfect for tracing designs and colouring with glitter pens. You can achieve a real stained glass effect with this type.

Frosted
My personal favourite as you can still trace through this but it has an icy look when it's shrunk down. Draw and colour on the shiny or frosted side for different effects. You can also paint the frosted side with acrylic paint and the colour looks stunning through the shiny side.

Black
Fabulous when left plain on the glossy side. The matt side has a velvety effect when it's shrunk - fabulous for butterflies and flowers.

Pastel Pink, Pastel Blue & White
I never used these colours much at first but now I love them. Beautiful for creating flowers and also for rubber stamping designs onto. You're left with a matt, coloured background and it goes with the rubber stamp image perfectly. Lovely colours for spring projects.

I stock all of these shrink plastics in my on-line shop www.silverclaycreations.bigcartel.com

Welcome to my New Blog

Welcome everyone!

This blog is for everyone who loves making things and for those of you who are new to shrink plastic or have already had the pleasure of using it. I hope to inspire you, share ideas, techniques and just generally talk about all things shrink plastic!

Please add yourself as a follower, that way you'll get a reminder whenever I post. Please also leave your comments as I love to hear from you all and it's lovely to chat and exhange ideas.

Lots of love & best wishes,

Natalia x