Art Dolls: Clay Over Cloth How-to

"Frost Fairy" a clay over cloth doll by Yve

Quite often art dolls are created with clay head, hands and feet attached to a fiber-filled cloth body (which is all covered with clothing). But did you know you can apply air-dry clay directly to a stuffed cloth doll?  This is done for a number of reasons.  A layer of clay can hide seams and give a nice, smooth surface for painting facial features but still have a soft, squishy body.   Dimensional details such as nose, lips, eyelids, etc are easy to add with the clay.  Some artists prefer to needle-sculpt the face details before applying Creative Paperclay while others, like the artist show here, prefer to make these dolls with a flat, unsculpted cloth face and add features with Creative Paperclay.   The added bonus is you can make a poseable button-jointed cloth doll a lot easier and faster than a BJD!

Make a cloth doll body look like clay

Rivkah Mizrahi of Dollmakers Muse shows us how to apply air dry clay to a cloth doll body to make it look like it's sculpted from clay by filling joints with Paperclay.

A second demonstration of same technique can be found here

How to Use Paperclay with Cloth Dolls

'Cloth over clay' and 'clay over cloth' techniques explained in this 2-part tutorial from Freaky Little Things.  Tutorial is written for a the beginner.