Tutorial: Clay Stamp Making

This is a technique I have wanted to try out for a while after seeing the idea mentioned on a blog somewhere and thought I would give it a go myself. It looked like a great way to create texture and textured surfaces in my work without having a spend a lot of money and also allowed me to do exactly what I wanted in my own unique style. Not to mention, I had some quick drying/non-firing clay left over from a previous project that I wanted to use up!

I really enjoyed this process. It was simple and straight forward and pretty quick (although you do need to take into account drying times) I’ve used these stamps a few times now and they seem to be holding up fine, so should last for a while.

I’m sure there are more ways you could use clay to make stamps than what I have come up with (already I have a few other thoughts that I want to experiment with) so this should only be a basis for your own creativity.

You will need: quick dry clay, tools/implements to make marks and a flat surface.

The first step is to get a small bit of clay (it all depends how big you want your stamp to be) and roll it into a ball.

Then press the ball flat, but not too thin, and smooth it as much as possible. The flatter it is, the better your prints will be that you can take from it. Then use your tools to scrape a pattern into the clay. Make sure you don’t press too deep or you may break it when you apply pressure when printing.

Allow the clay to dry somewhere flat. Again, keeping it flat it important to make sure you get good prints. When it is thoroughly dried out, coat it in glue to seal it. It will make it last longer and mean you can clean it with water to remove paint without damaging the stamp.

Once it has dried you can print with it! I’ve found the best way of getting prints is to put the paper on top and press into the clay stamp, but it does work pressing the other way, although not quite as cleanly. You can then check your print out to see how well it has worked.

The following pictures are an example of what I made with a couple of my stamps.

I painted a page in my junk journal (see blog post where I talk about my process making it here) in orange and transferred a thin layer of brown paper over the top. I then used my two stamps in a dark red and black to print randomly over the top.

I think this has created an interesting background, which I may decide to leave as it is, or I’ll add something over the top at some point in the future.