Proto Polymer Clay, 50 g, Soot Brown No. 23

Proto polymer clay is a modelling clay that stays soft and workable for as long as you need, then hardens permanently when you bake it in an ordinary kitchen oven. Each bar holds 50 grams of a single colour. It is firm when the pack is opened and turns smooth after a minute of kneading, and any two colours can be blended into a new shade before baking.

It is the right material for things you want to keep — charms, beads, earrings, miniatures, small sculpture, figures for a model. Warm it in your hands until it is pliable, shape it on a ceramic tile or a sheet of foil, then bake it and let it cool. Once hard it can be sanded, drilled, glued and painted with acrylic. Children work with it happily; the oven part belongs to an adult.

This bar is soot brown — a dark, smoky brown sitting between brown and black, useful for wood, bark, chocolate and shading.

• Oven-bake polymer clay, 50 g bar, one colour per bar
• Hardens in a home oven in roughly 15–30 minutes; use the temperature printed on the pack (110–130 °C)
• Takes acrylic paint and ink after baking, and can be sanded or drilled
• Made in Thailand. Never microwave it, and keep an adult on the oven