Tutorial: Hearts & Roses Keepsake Box

Cover a heart-shaped box with clay roses and cording to create this pretty keepsake box.   A nice place to keep all those love letters and Valentine's Day cards! ;-)

Tutorial was scanned from a Portuguese-language magazine and kindly translated to English by our friend Evelyne. Please visit her blog 'Sowl Mini'.

Materials needed:
Heart-shaped wood or mache box
Cold Porcelain tinted in colors for roses and cording
(Salmon, peach, pink, rose, crimson, etc)
Golden cord (soutache)
Clay roller or pasta machine
Clay Scissors
Leaf shape cutter (Kemper cutters)
Clay extruder

 We'll be using the small trefoil disk (3 overlapping circles) which is part of the disk set included with the crank-handle Walnut Hollow Extruder (new), the twist-handle Makin's Extruder and the push-handle Sculpey Extruder.




      

Step-by-Step

1)  (1)  The first step is to paint the box in a light salmon color.   Paint the inside white or color of your choice.  Use some pre-tinted white cold porcelain (CP) .   Roll the CP into a long sheet 1/32" (1mm) thick. Cut a strip 1 1/2" (4cm) wide and glue it on the center of the lid, vertically.

2)  Trim the excess of the CP flush to the edge of  the lid, following the box shape, using small scissors.

3)  Use the extruder with a 3 sided trefoil shape disk (see picture above) and make 11 strips out of CP, pre-tinted salmon to match the box. Roll the strips to create cording. Place each extruded shape on the work surface, place a hand on each end and roll strip in  opposite directions (one hand forward and the other backward). Leave 'cording' to dry till the next day.

4) Make the strips longer than the lid itself.   Clay will shrink a little.

5) Glue the strips one to the other, in pairs, and let them sit for a couple of hours until glue is completely dry.

6) Glue each pair of strips, a pair at a time, to the lid of the box.  Press them tightly together so that they won't break apart while drying.

7)  Trim the excess 'cord' strips that hang over edge of the lid with the scissors.

8)  Glue some more 'cord' strips along the side of the lid for edging.  Cut the ends where they meet in a diagonal for nice finishing.

9) Photo of the box and the lid as completed this far.

10)  Pre-tint some CP with rose or crimson oil or acrylic paint. Roll it flat to 1/32" (1mm) thick and cut 7 petals with an average size cutter.

11) Make the petals thinner by pressing them with your fingers as shown.

12)  Roll the first petal around a stick to form the core of a rose.

13) Do the same to the second and third petals, by placing them around the first to complete the core, overlapping as you go.

14) Gently turn outward the upper edge of the remaining 4 petals, both on the left and on the right.

15) Wrap these 4 petals around the core.

16)  Trim the excess clay off bottom of flower with the small scissors, removing flower from stick.  Set aside to dry.

17)  Tint some CP in 3 other flower colors to make more roses.  Repeat steps 10-16 to make roses.  You'll need about 14 flowers.

18)  Make a small strip of the CP from the crimson color (make a small roll and flatten it)

19) Roll the strip into a coil to form a rose-bud (completed buds shown in step 20).

20)  Make several buds using the colors you made the roses with.  Cut some 1 1/8" (3cm) strips of golden cord (soutache) and glue the tips together to make small loops.  These will be the rose leaves.  If you don't have any cord, you could always make some small green leaves from CP.

21)  Glue alternating roses and rose-buds on each side of the white strip on the lid. Glue the golden loops (leaves) between them on both sides.    Finished heart & flowers box shown below.

The photo above also shows a couple of other options.   Use the same cording technique to cover a photo frame or a small mirror and embellish with roses and rosebuds.   A very feminine option is to cover the lid of the box completely with roses and trim edge with clay cording as shown on right.

Wouldn't one of these make a great gift!   I'm sure any bride would just love a flower-covered heart box!  ;-)