On a (Jelly) Roll....

Sometimes, revisiting a technique learned a long time ago can spark new ideas.  I was looking at some old jelly roll canes, and started playing around with them. Pretty soon, I was making new rolls, and cutting slices and making sheets from the canes.  That, of course, led to some jewelry pieces.

The jelly roll is actually the second simple cane I learned about when I first was introduced to polymer, the bull's eye being the first.  The jelly rolls I first made were just simple stacks of clay, piled and rolled.  As you'll see in the examples I'm posting here, the jelly rolls I've been making have two outer layers (white and dark) and a Skinner blend laid on top and rolled in as the colored layer.  This is certainly more elaborate than the simple jelly roll I was introduced to, but it's also more colorful and more interesting.

The cuff bracelet and tube earrings on the left give you a good image of the cane.  You can see the layers of white and navy, and the Skinner blend on the wider sheet that swirls around the core going from navy to yellow blending into green along the way.

These two pendant and earring sets have texture in the dark areas, and are sooth and buffed on the cane sections.  The strip of light green down the middle of the pendant on the left is made from some sweet glass beads called "super duos"- I wanted something to define the line between the clay sections, and these beads just seemed to fit.

Time for a color-way change!  I moved, naturally, into some of my favorite colors: purples and teal with pale yellow for accent.

The first photo shows a couple of pendants and some small earrings.  Perhaps you've already noticed the curving strip of translucent super duos in the pendant on the top left?  No color or texture separation here, it just seemed like the piece needed a stream of beads running through it.


And, finally, a really purple pendant with colorful sun-drops!

Perhaps some of you will be inspired to re-vist the jelly roll. If you've never made one, summer's the perfect time to experiment and play with clay!