Day 7 – 100 Days of Polymer Clay Challenge

Day 7

Technique: Bracelet with extruded flower inserts

Win: Absolutely

Challenge:

• Getting perfectly rounded flowers with centres from my extruder.

• Pressing the flowers onto the bracelet cutter shape without distorting either the flowers or the bracelet shape.

Lessons Learned:

• I ordered a bespoke flower extruder disc from Louise to try this technique. It does extrude the flowers beautifully, but cutting them cleanly is tricky. At least one petal often gets squashed, leaving it flat on one side.

• After several attempts, including putting the clay in the freezer for five minutes to firm it up, I realised that making a small round cane was the best way to preserve the flower shape.

• Getting the little cane slices to sit neatly on the bracelet was more difficult than I expected. In the end, I pressed a shallow hollow with my finger, placed the cane slice into that, burnished it gently with paper, and then lightly rolled over the surface with my roller.
• Imperfections, especially edges such as those from cane slices, become much more visible once the piece is varnished. Clean finishing really matters with this technique.

Confidence Level: 9/10

Notes:

• To create the flower centre inside the extruder, I rolled a thin cylinder of clay and wrapped it in the petal colour, forming a small “sausage” that fit into the extruder barrel.

• The bracelet cutter I used was also made for me by Louise, who created both the custom flower extruder disc and the bracelet cutter for this technique. They can be ordered from her if anyone is interested.

Reflection:

This felt like a day of persistence and problem-solving. What started as a simple idea turned into a series of small engineering puzzles. Each attempt revealed a little more about how the clay behaves, and by the end the solution felt both practical and satisfying.