Tuesday, July 19, 2016

From Failure to Triumph - a Friendly Plastic Pen Success Story

Workshops don't always go to plan. Sometimes, things go wrong and you end up with a less than successful result. It's always a disappointment for the student but I'm equally disappointed when someone doesn't have success.

I had one of those workshops last week. We were making Friendly Plastic Pens. Here's some of the pens which turned out really well.

But here are some pen barrels which turned out less than perfect.

So what do you do when things don't turn out as planned?

Well, I gave it some thought and came up with a Plan B. I decided refoiling the Friendly Plastic would give us a better result.

But alas, Plan B was a big failure - the foil wouldn't stick to the tacky adhesive we'd applied to the Friendly Plastic no matter how much we burnished it.

So it was on to Plan C - applying an iridescent finish to mask all the previous layers. And the result is spectacular - the ugly duckling has turned into a beautiful swan!

Now I have a new technique to play around with and perfect (and perhaps a new workshop to teach!). It just goes to show that even experts have craft disasters. But it also shows you that with a bit of creative thinking, you can turn a failure into a triumph!

'Til next time.....








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