Ceramic Jewelry Box Part 3 & News
This is the continuation of part 1 and part 2 of a custom project that I am making for Texas based artist, Jean. It’s always a pleasure and an honor when another creative person commissions pottery from me – Thanks Jean!
Stoneware jewelry box with butterflies and bunny knob
My original plans for today did not call for posting part 3 of this ongoing series, however after tossing and turning for an hour at an ungodly time of o-dark-hundred, I finally decided to get up at 5am to begin my day with a cup of coffee and some blogging before heading to school to substitute teach. I finished the construction of the box yesterday and brought the box inside so that it can begin drying in preparation for bisque firing. I hope to squeeze it in with my student’s work on Sunday afternoon.
When Jean initially asked me to combine butterflies and a rabbit for a special birthday gift for her sister, I wasn’t sure how the 2 images would work together without being too saccharine. After sculpting the bunny knob, I think it works. What do you think? Granted, the box isn’t finished – it still has to undergo separate bisque and glaze firings – and I’m going to be adding ceramic laser toner butterfly decals to the respective shapes before calling it done.
I took a lot of photos to document the project – if you’re interested take a look at the gallery images below.
Meanwhile, I did my first laser toner decal firing yesterday and lo and behold, it works!! More on the process later – I took notes during the firing.
Tea bag saucer with water lily decal
You may remember this sketch of my water lily painting from this post. I took the image into Photoshop and resized it appropriately for this decal test firing and printed it out at 300 dpi onto decal paper. It’s not terribly apparent from the photo, but the image is a nice dark sepia tone which I think will work nicely on Jean’s jewelry box.
I'm attempting to dry the box evenly by adding rubber bands on each end to keep the lid from distorting.
I encountered a slight design challenge – after I cut the lid off of the box, the ends started drying at different rates and began lifting. As an experiment – I am drying the box with the rubber bands in place. I’m tempted to bisque the box with the rubber bands in place – they’ll burn off fairly quickly. Maybe not though, the rubber might leave a discoloration.
So, what’s my news? I received an email from the Landscape Architecture department at the University of Colorado and I’ve been re-admitted to the graduate program starting this fall. I’m super excited – but haven’t received the official letter yet. I was going to hold out, but you know me, I can’t. 
Have a great weekend everyone,
~Cynthia
