Well my creative efforts have lead me to resin! And yes, I now have a resin obsession! I’m not sure why I’m always interested in hobbies that are bad for my health and my skin!!! I am not going to age well : (

I have quite a collection of purchased and handmade moulds made from latex and silicone which I am playing around with. Everywhere I look I now see mould potential; ice cube trays, cupcake trays, cheese and cracker containers, plastic lids….

The discovery of resin was inevitable. Living coastally in New Zealand I am surrounded by so many other creative people, using the environment as their inspiration. I try to walk my dog every day in the bush or on the beach, combing for tiny treasures. So resin is the prefect medium for me to capture these collections.

Also, it results in a beautiful, light weight, durable product that I hope to market to the curious tourist  ; ) So much more potential than my previous efforts using plaster and concrete, whose market is somewhat limited!

After a lot of late nights researching resin and the range of uses I purchased my first can of Norski Kleer-Kast Diamond clear liquid embedding resin. I ordered it online from Total Body Shop, along with some white pigment. It arrived safely a couple of days later, and I was off!  www.totalbodyshop.co.nz

I found many helpful tutorials on http://www.resinobsession.com

The resin is easy to use, using just drops of a catalyst to start the curing. I found a perfect mould to practice on, using the plastic containers the Dip n’go’s crackers come in. They needed 30ml of the resin and 6 drops of the catalyst. I didn’t use any release wax, and once cured I could simply cut a nip in the plastic and peal the mould away. I was pretty excited and should have left them to cure longer, so unfortunately got a few finger prints on the pieces ; )

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have a small glass front fridge that I use for storing my work while it is curing. This helps prevent debris contaminating the pieces and also helps contain the potent smell!

You can see in the crab piece below loose sand that has set in the resin

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some other things I tried was coating a kina I resin and using my silicone moulds to make a domed magnet, sandy beads for my Pandora bracelet and a cicada encapsulated necklace droplet.

 

My first attempts at resin!