This easy, faux crackle technique can become the base for a multitude of clay designs. It works the best the easiest as a veneer technique on raw clay designs. And like many happy accidents and tutorials here at KatersAcres, this faux crackle technique has a story too. It also pairs nicely and easily with the Faux Collage Veneers tutorial too! Are you ready to try it? Let’s get started!

Do you ever have a happy accident? I have lots of them. I purchased some crafter’s webbing (2 years ago) with the intent to make a nice wreath for my front door (thank you Pinterest) in white tulle and fancy ribbon with blue polymer snowflakes for winter. Do you know what happened? Yep … I never made the wreath. I guess I’m just not a wreath maker. Long story shorter, in January / February I had a huge studio clearance sale and stumbled about this roll of webbing as I was clearing things out. I didn’t even remember I had it! Sadly, it still had the purchase sticker on it and everything. *Sigh, silly wreath project* Well, I opened it and unrolled it. And you know what it looked like to me? CrAcKle. So you know what I had to do … experiment. So experiment I did. And this is what I came up with … so I hope you enjoy and have fun making your own faux crackle to use on all sorts of things. And if all else fails, you can always make a wreath!

Materials:

• Premo Polymer Clay
• Medium Body Acrylic Paint in your choice of color
• Mesh Crafter’s Webbing
• Pasta Machine
• Rubbing Alcohol in Spritz Bottle
• Baby Wipes

How to: Faux Crackle Technique

• Fully prepare and condition the color and amount of Premo! clay you will need.
• For this example I have prepared one 2 ounce block of white Premo! clay.
• Cover the entire sheet with the desired color of a medium body acrylic paint.
• I have used a black Liquitex paint.
• Allow to dry fully. (This may take several hours depending on clay and paints used.)
• Once the paint is dry, place the mesh crafter’s webbing onto the sheet of clay.
• Thoroughly embed into the sheet using an acrylic brayer.
• You want the mesh to be embedded into the sheet so that it will not easily lift up.
• Spray liberally with rubbing alcohol from a mister bottle.
• Use several baby wipes and begin the process of removing the paint from the sheet of clay.
• You may need several baby wipes depending on how thickly you laid down the paint and how dry the paint is on the sheet of clay.
• Continue wiping the paint off until you are down to the base layer of clay between the mesh areas.
• Then slowly remove the mesh from the sheet of clay.
• What is left behind is a gorgeous “crackle” like pattern that can be used for a variety of projects!
• The cool part is that as you use this veneer, part of it will truly “crackle” along the paint lines adding an additional level of “cool” to your faux crackle.
• As a side note, this technique works fabulously with the Faux Collage Veneers Tutorial too.

Thanks for joining me today,

Happy Claying,

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