PMC (Precious Metal Clay) is a new medium developed in Japan. It allows for a great variety of textural and organic designs, following the inspiration I find in nature and natural objects. I’ve combined many of these pieces with gemstones and pearls from the earth and ocean, creating an organic natural look and feel. I hope that when you wear them you too will feel beautiful and radiant, in harmony with the elements of nature. PMC starts out as a clay consisting of water and microscopic particles of silver or gold suspended in an organic binder. The water and binder burn away during firing, leaving solid .999 pure silver or gold. At this point in the process additional layers and parts can be added to the piece, which is then refired, sometimes multiple times like a collage. When I am satisfied with the piece it is then polished, tumbled, burnished, soldered, oxidized, or whatever other finishing is desired. Sometimes a surface patina is applied, which gives varying shades, from bronze and greens to blues and purples.
Most of these pieces are one-of-a-kind works of art, as the natural objects they were created with are destroyed during firing and cannot be reused. There are a few limited edition pieces, where I have made a mold of the fired piece at a point during construction which can then be reused again for the basic shape. Designing with PMC often involves adding many layers (sometimes 12 to 15) of thin silver hand applied and built up to the desired thickness. There can be a lot of wasteage, and the price of PMC is about 4 times that of regular silver. The higher cost of these pieces therefore reflects the artistic effort, uniqueness, quality, time intensity, and materials cost required. For care, these fine silver pieces should not tarnish like sterling silver and can be kept clean with a soft cloth and/or soap and water. Don’t use a tarnish remover on pieces with an oxidized patina, as it will remove the colors.
(Susan is a Certified Artisan of the PMC Guild.)
