Last night I worked on a pendant which didn't quite turn out as planned. I used white in my third layer to make some tree branches and then sifted about 4 different layers of pink, purple, and cream to try and produce something resembling a cherry blossom. It was all going fairly well until the very last firing where I was trying to get all layers to maturity so that the surface would be generally smooth and shiny. Because the previous seven firings had been successful I was surprised when I opened the kiln door and saw that the white enamel had been overfired and basically bled outwards.
It turns out that the white enamel that we got in our kits is a pretty hard enamel/colour and should only be used as the base coat and not for subsequent layers. Apparently I should have used what's called "foundation white" if I wanted to use white in a non-base layer (not very intuitive from the name). That would have been a softer enamel and wouldn't have required firing for so long. I ended up trying to add a few more layers of pink and green to cover up some of the white that had bled to the sides and that's where I left it at the end of the night. Not quite the way I wanted but not bad for a first design. I should call it "Abstract Cherry Blossom".
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