Studio Saturday Get Your Kicks with Creative Impressions In Clay

Welcome to Studio Saturday! Each week one of our contributors gives you a sneak peek into their studio, creative process or inspirations. We ask a related question of our readers and hope you'll leave comments! As an incentive we offer a free prize each week to bribe you to use that keyboard. The following week we choose a random winner.
This weeks winner is Melissa Meman. Congratulations! 

You have won a Birdhouse Pendant from the studio of Jennifer Heynen. 

Send Jennifer an e-mail with your address and she will get it right out to you.

This week we visit the studio of Tari Sasser at Creative Impressions In Clay

Love to Travel? Tis the season. I was asked to design a collection of 4 buttons for a client. The theme is Travel for this line of clothing. I love that I get to come up with my own designs. The only design specified was the Route 66 button. Brainstorming is the fun part. What do you associate with travel? Of course those ideas need to translate into a 1" to 1.25" format. Minute detail usually doesn't work. 

Thinking I had been so original with the license plate idea, I did a web search...of course this existed already and you could buy LUV 2 TRVL as a door mat for your RV. Oh well, I liked it anyway.

Sending mail or postcards is also associated with travel. Being an internet junkie, I did a web search for stamps. Traveling in a car is how my family goes on vacation, this stamp killed 2 birds with one stone, a car on a stamp. Besides, I thought it was a cool graphic.

You have to put your clothes in something, so of course we needed a suitcase. The old type with travel stickers on them worked out great. Putting details on the tiny stickers did not, so we opted for blocks of color.

This is the group I managed to get glazed and shipped. Not quite half of the order. I managed to not do so well with my deadline. I used to live and die by deadlines in the corporate world! But something happened on the way to the forum...I messed up when I poured the mold. Yes, I still use plaster, my mistake. If you pour plaster too wet over dry clay prototypes, let's just say it's bad. The shoulda, coulda, woulda's were abundant after this! I managed to clean up and salvage 3 of the design molds. Fixing molds isn't really that much fun and time consuming to boot. I had to carve another license prototype. It turned out better than the first one, so BONUS on that one.

I have 60 more buttons to finish glazing, fire and overnight by Monday. Guess what I'm doing this weekend? This is reeking havoc on my back, elbows and hands. Sitting for hours with my elbows bent holding and painting little pieces of clay is painful. I'm tense because of missing a deadline and knowing I have to have these finished. A personal masseuse would be nice right about now. Calgon take me away or is it Robert Mondavi take me away. Someone, anyone...relaxing in Michigan by a lake for a week will have to do in 8 days. But who's counting.

My question this week is:

What is the worst mistake you have made on a project?

This type of question is always fun because we have all made mistakes when we are working. Working on a deadline makes it even worse.

Leave a comment and you could "Get Your Kicks on Route 66" with one of my Route 66 buttons. How cool would that be on your travel tote?!