Shoe Week: How to Make a Custom Doll Shoe

There's a large percentage of air-dry clay fans who like to create dolls...human figures and fantasy figures.  Some of these are fixed in position and some are poseable.   Some are simple sculpts, some are cloth dolls with clay limbs and some are sophisticated BJDs.  There's many ways you can model a figure but what they all have in common is the need for shoes!   You can always sculpt any kind of shoe with your favorite clay, but sometimes we like to have a fabric or leather shoe!    All tutorials featured this week will be devoted to crafting shoes for dolls of all sizes and shapes, removable and non-removable!   Let's start with some Mary Jane's and basic shoe-making skills.

Creating Armature & Body for Art Doll

These are instructions for creating a sturdy wire frame doll armature that is also padded and wrapped to complete the body of an art doll.   This type of art doll body is designed to have a clay head, arms/hands and legs/feet attached and to be permanently covered with clothing.   This body form is bendable and positionable, but, once placed in desired position, it's not usually re-positioned again and again like a jointed doll would be.