Copper teardrop charm and polymer clay pebble earrings

Antiqued copper earrings featuring all components that I have made myself, from the earwires, teardrop shaped hand crafted charms with a flower imprint and turquoise coloured polymer clay pebbles.

The teardrop flower charms have been hand made from copper clay, impressed with a flower texture, cut and hand formed and later highly polished and antiqued and selectively polished to highlight the pattern. The charms dangle beneath a trio of hand formed polymer clay pebbles, made from a faux stone clay with mineral inclusions and in a colour that I mixed and textured myself.

The earrings drop 62m (2.4") overall from the top of my straight drop earwires and hang 14mm (0.55") wide in wear. They are quite substantial in size, but deceptively light to wear due to the materials used.


What is copper clay / precious metal clay?

Copper clay is a clay like medium made from tiny particles of copper (other metals are available too), combined with an organic binder and made into a pliable clay or paste with water. After working with the clay-like medium to form the article, it is thoroughly dried to remove all of the water, the shape is then further refined and then fired at high temperature to both burn off the binders and to cause the copper particles to fuse together as solid metal. Whilst the medium makes it possible to achieve things not possible with other metal forms, it is still quite time-consuming and there are several stages to achieving a nice finish.

Please see this blog post for more on my methods for making such pieces.