One of the best things about polymer clay is that it readily lends itself to almost any technique. It can also perfectly mimic many different materials, as is nicely shown in the artwork by Liliya Fadeeva. She chose to imitate soutache embroidery and creates beautiful filigree pieces that are hard to tell from real soutache pieces.
There was a time in Liliya‘s life when she wanted to do something interesting in her free time. She started looking for options on the Internet and, among other things, there were some interesting polymer clay products. She was intrigued but not enough to try the medium out herself. Years later, she came across polymer creations again.
This time she bought a few blocks of clay, tried working with it and I liked it so much that she immediately ordered the necessary materials and tools.
In the beginning, she sculpted dolls and decorated mugs and spoons. Then she decided to choose a niche - brooches. She loves complex work, in which you need to pay a lot of attention to the tiniest details, so she went for imitation soutache. She started off by recreating the work of soutache masters, because she found it difficult to come up with something original right away, but now she creates her original designs and constantly thinks about new possibilities. We also appreciate the colour schemes she applies in her work. Liliya says she always tries to choose more difficult colour combinations, rather than going for something obvious.
Liliya started offering her artwork online and she‘s been very successful. She wants to grow her business slowly since she doesn‘t have much free time to allocate to her artwork and her technique is very time consuming. On average, one brooch takes about 25 hours, sometimes a little less or more, depending on the complexity and size. In the near future she would like to further refine her own style and she is dreaming about becoming a full-time artist.
