haai im a fat little porcelain birdie

ive been busy designing and making a porcelain bird pendant for the design indaba. it's quite a long process, from carving the birdie out of wax, then making a mould of it, waiting for the mould to dry, casting the slip (you can only do like 3/4 max a day) cleaning up the slips and then firing them....twice!, firstly a bisque firing and then a glaze firing....im waiting for my friend Faith to let me know when she can fire them for me.....and time is running out...scary nailbiting stuff folks....
check out the process....

i start mapping out and carvin the bird from a little block of wax, you can see how i marked out the wings, i do the first half first and then copy the second half.

roughly taking shape...

wax birdie cleaned and ready for mould making

making the first half of the mould,.... its tricky to keep the bird balanced in the middle....you want to be able to get the wax out easily and you also need to think about where you want the seem....
you make the mould in 2 parts....this is the first half. my friend sian taught me how to make plaster of paris moulds...

2 parts of the mould, before i filed in the pouring hole at the bottom of the bird.

porcelain birdies, ready to be fired. after firing they will be a lovely white.
i will put up a photo of the finished birdie as soon as i can. i love small little fat birds.