My Experience Making A Polymer Clay Purse

My first attempt making a polymer clay purse failed! Unfortunately it turned out too heavy to wear...

Couple{sorry, not good quality} pics of the process:

First I made grey colored inside of the bag - bottom and lid at the same time, then cured. Second - attached blue colored clay and embellishments to the bottom part of the purse, then cured.

The next step was to create the top part of the future purse. I put the lid on, then applied Kato Repel Gel to the grey line of the purse's bottom with hope that medium will protect blue clay from sticking to it. Then I repeated to embellish the lid and put the finished piece into the oven.

Actually, when I worked on the bottom part of the purse I had an idea that the purse would be hardly wearable because of the weight, but still had a little hope. My tiny edge of hope disappeared when the whole piece was finished, but I was not too disappointed and decided to use it as a keepsake box. Ah... I forgot to tell that I signed inside of the supposed purse, too, and it looked so very nice :)

You can't imagine my wonderment when I took my piece out of the oven and couldn't open it! I've tried in many ways, but nothing! Kato Repel Gel disappointed me... It got stuck together completely!!!

Not being able to use it as a keepsake box, I will use it as a home design element :) I decided to whiten it a little bit, using white acrylic paint.

Conclusions:

1. If you want to make a wearable polymer clay purse, you should not use weight enhancing texture pieces. instead of this use a variety of colorful canes to obtain a textured look

2. I'm not entirely sure, but I believe that the Kato Repel Gel didn't work properly because I added embellishments pushing them down after attaching another layer of clay

3. Making a purse is an intriguing process when you know exactly what you are doing :)

It's my first, but not last attempt to make a PC purse, so stay tuned!