"The Golden Girl" Altered Bust by Lucy Reese

"The Golden Girl" Altered Bust 
Designed by Lucy Reese

SUPPLIES:

Ceramic Bust
Makin's Clay® - White or any light color - "leftover/scrap" clay is fine for this project
Makin's® Professional Cutting Mat
Makin's® Professional™ Ultimate Clay Extruder™ - small hole disc #7
Makin's® Professional™ Clay Tool Kit
Makin's Clay® Lg. Texture Sheet - Floral
Makin's Clay® Push Mold- Leaves & Floral
Martha Stewart Mold- Butterflies & Buttons
Heavy Gesso
Art Alchemy Paints- Steampunk Copper, Pink Blush, & Vintage Rose
Clear drying adhesive

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Begin by giving the bust a coat of heavy gesso.

2. Add Makin's Clay® at her bust line to build a dress, then impress with the the Floral texture sheet for added design.

3. Now grab all your molds a build her a beautiful headpiece with Makin's Clay® molded elements, mixing and layering your assorted flowers & butterflies.  If you mount your elements while the clay is still fresh, additional adhesive is not needed as fresh clay will stick to fresh clay without additional adhesive.  Applying the pieces while the clay is fresh also allows you to more easily mold the different flowers & butterflies over and around each other, lift the wings of your butterflies and petals of some of your flowers or dimension, etc.

4. To add even more interest to the back of her head, use the Ultimate Clay Extruder™and multi-hole disc #7 to extrude clay, apply a touch of adhesive and mount extruded strands around the back of the headband.

5. As a final accent to the front of the bust, make a necklace by using the button mold to form a pendant and your extruded clay strands to form the chain.  Mount with a touch of adhesive. 

6. After all the clay has dried (approximately 24 hours under normal atmospheric conditions), give her another coat of gesso and cover the entire piece in the Steampunk Copper paint. At this point you can leave her as is or give her headpiece and necklace some highlights with the other paints as I did here as finishing touches.

I hope you all enjoyed this project. I must give a big shout out to the creative ladies at Polymer Clay T.V for my inspiration on this piece. Remember you can always find me at tecniquefreak.wordpress.com or LReneeDesigns on Instagram. I would love to hear from you!

~Lucy