Paper clay

Hi everyone!

Even before starting working with real clay (or terracota) my dream has been to find a real good modeling paste that its easy to make, doesnt have much chemicals inside and thus I can stur with my hands, doesnt get sort of rubbery (so flour or starch are no no material) , doesnt need to be cooked, doesnt crack whilst drying, doesnt take too much time to dry, doesnt leave lumps in the end, doesnt "gain" mold after a while (so flour or starch are no no material even if treated or mixed with something to prevent (I tried!)) .

Up until now and even after lots of research online, couldnt find one that really suited me. For the faces of my dolls (@ myroyaldolls.wix.com/myroyaldolls) couldnt possibly allow any type of wrinkle, lump, etc, so faces and hands are (and I guess will always be) air drying modeling paste which I can get from shops (rather cheap). For the structures have newspaper and white glue, cardboard if necessary and for some small fillings I normally use toilet paper and glue.

If you watched the previous post about a hat making you read that I have been using "paper clay" to fill and re-shape it.
This paper clay is extremely easy to do and here's the "recipe":

First I grab some toilet paper and soak it on water:

Then I rinse, say, 70% of the water and add a coffee spoon full of oil (just frying oil from the kitchen) and glue.
The glue I use to make the clay is paper glue that normally comes like flakes, so basically its like putting icing sugar on strawberries (yummy!!)
I live on a rather humid athmosphere so the flakes sort of became like shewing gum, but as I cant afford to throw such precious material to the garbage, I still use it anyway

Then use a mixer to blend all together.

Now, because it has already the glue mixed and I dont want to throw away the "juices" but at the same time the paste is still too wet I keep on adding toilet paper and mix, adding and mix until it reaches the consistency that I want.

It might not look much but once thik and with a fair amount of glue it can be a great paste to play with although I tend to use it only when I need to fill in big areas or shape large sculptures like horses, folds on some doll's skirts, or... hats!
The drying time obviously depends upon how thick the applied layer is, so... lets say, something with around 1 centimetre can take 2 to 3 sunny days to dry!

Hope you enjoyed and... now its time to have some fun, allez! ;)