Tired but Happy Purkiness

Ahoy there, how be you all? Lots to talk about, so going to be a tad brisk! hehehe

I have been working manically hard getting ready for shows and such. On the 20th of November Purky attended the Chocolate Festival in Frome.

Remember I had been working hard on new stock, revamping packaging and investing in new display equipment?

Well, do you think it was worth it?

Ego a Go Go that I am, I was super proud of how the stands looked. Been working into the early hours of the morning getting ready for this :)

I work full time as well, so been spending the hard earned pennies on the new display gear.

I know it probably sounds silly but it looks so .....legitimate? Like I really am a jewellery designer and polymer clay artist rather than a pretender.



Isn't it odd the way we seek to validate ourselves?




Anyways, sadly the festival wasn't my best trading show but it was delicious being there again. I really loved it last time and this year was also fabulous.

I did some brilliant networking and met lovely people.

I felt proud of my work for the first time in a very long time.

I got to spend the day with my amazing friend Vix, or Mrs Super VixieAsbo of www.supervixieasbo.blogspot.com (She was totally awesome)......(We ate really tasty alcoholic truffles together)......(and cream cakes).....(hehehehehe)

All in all? a Victory. I went to bed very satisfied with the day's events.

I was rushed of my feet so sadly didnt get chance to take many other photos which was a shame but check out Muriel Lavender's blog http://muriel-lavender.blogspot.com/2011/11/if-chocolate-be-food-of-love.html?spref=fb and FromeTV made a film of the event http://www.frome.tv/2011/11/dip-into-fromes-chocolate-festival/

If I promise to blog more frequently would folks let me off? I have to write up about the Storytelling performance I did, Hogswatch trading and other exciting things.

For now though, off to bed. My faithfull feline snuggled up beside me.

Massive hugs you lot

H

xx

A quick extruder tutorial

I feel that I should freely distribute some of my techniques. Why? Well the internet has been kind to me and I feel I should pass that forward.

Here is my take on the now classic extruder cane technique or Klimt Kane (see what I did there?)

Personally I like to work with three or four colours to generate an interesting repeating pattern and enough contrast to ensure the cane has a strong image even when reduced.

These are stacked discs cut using a small kemper cutter that matches the extruder barrel's diameter.

I use a Makins extruder and frankly it is the best moderately priced tool on the market for the job. The barrel is easy to clean, load and extrude because it uses a screwing motion rather than pressure.

As your cane is extruded it will wibble about everywhere, do not worry about that because we will straighten it all out shortly.

Also, bear in mind that the colour at the end will envelop the entire cane when stacking and extruding. Hurrah for fluid dynamics in arts and crafts!

Show your wobbly sausage who is boss by chopping it into equal lengths and arranging them together. I usually use a square stack and cane formation for ease.

Continue the polymer punishement by squashing the cane to eliminate air bubbles and ensure adhesion.

This is also a quick way to reduce the cane with relatively little distortion.

Ta daa! Une Cane :) Notice the uneven raw end, but we will be slicing that off shortly.

Reduce and recombine extruded cane elements to your hearts content :)

Then slice the buggers up and use them to create lovely things.

Ta very much folks :) Hope you enjoy!

Mwah x

Prince What a Mess

Do any of you know those books? 'Prince What A Mess'? They are about a very mucky afghan puppy


Anyways, my studio reminds me of those stories

 Been doing some serious production work and my studio erm, reflects this.











However, I think these chocolatey delights are worth it.

Big Sunday hugs

xx

One Month Later

So a month ago, today, my family buried our Mother.

It was actually a really lovely day and beautiful service. I will post about that at some point.

However, this is a post about some jewellery I made.

A while before she died Mum and I talked about making memento jewellery from fine silver using precious metal clay. It was so she could always be with us.

These are sculpey moulds of Mum's thumbprints. The piece on the far right is a thumb imprint made from the moulds. This was used to imprint the silver clay.

Silver clay rolled out ready to take the imprint.

Cutting out the clay around the thumbprints.

The pieces were dried and then filed/sanded to give them smooth edges before firing.

Fired in my kiln according to manufacturers instructions!

After firing the pieces have a fine white layer over them, this is the organic binder burning out of the clay.

Using a brass brush clean all the residue off :)












Mmmm liver of sulphur, guess what, it smells bad!
This is to put a patina on the silver and bring out the
thumbprints.

A lovely dark patina :)

After the patina is buffed off it settles in the cracks and voila, lovely shiny maternal thumbprints.

I made one for each of us. The one on the left uses an imprint mould and has my thumbprint in the back. That one is for me and now hangs on my necklace next to a pendant my sister bought me.







This is hardly my most detailed tutorial but happy to answer more specific questions in the comments.

Lots of hugs to you Purky Blurkers

xxx

Purky Packaging

From the beginning of Purky Products I had always intended to have shiny lovely packaging.

For many reasons, often financial, I put off designing and ordering.

My original logo was designed by Nikki Cox of Kiwi 2000 http://www.kiwi2000.com and she redesigned it to suit foil printing in a square.

I came home and found this box

And had to find something to open it!

And then said box was vanquished and inside there was.....!

A little beauty and soon all her friends came out to play!

And lets just finish with a whoop?

Very pleased with these. Roll on the Purky times.

Hugs everyone

xxx

Returning to my Blog

Its been somthing of a rough year so far.

Purky failed as a business, my relationship ended and my Mother has died.

After my last post, about something so important, I honestly did not know how to follow it.

These things however do not excuse me from active blogging and I apologise profusely to folks who have been waiting for an update.

I have been creative over the last month and taken literally hundreds of photos documenting my life and my work. There are several tutorials which I will get written up and released over this month.

A snap shot of pictures from the last month, just to give you some flavour.

Cute tame starling

My new adventures into indian cuisine

An important Purky project for the family in progress (full tutorial to follow eventually)

My beautiful sister on her wedding day

A gorgeous (late blooming) passion flower

My updated shrine, its a collation of things that are meaningful to me, though the skull candles are just for the ambiance of the thing....

New Purky display equipment and Phil supervising work in the new studio

New tile pendants, cufflinks and stud earrings about to be cured.

The night I met Lady Gaga...

New Revolution Pendants and new stud earrings.












I hope that gives you a flavour of what has been occuring in my life this month. I haven't included pictures from my Mother's funeral and other things like that.

I promise to return to regular blogging and my love and best wishes to all of you

Harry xx