Wedding giveaway tutorial – Olive oil bottles and clay name tags

Last week I designed a wedding for a very special couple whose taste and sense of aesthetic where the inspiration for these special place cards/ giveaways we made in my studio. As the design concept was based on natural elements such as lavender and olive trees – I decided to combine the place cards with this lovely memento of Israel and of the wedding design theme – mini-olive oil bottles featuring the couple’s names engraved on clay coins with the wedding date and a name card attached featuring the same logo stamped in ink.

Below is a tutorial explaining step by step how we created them. All I can say is that some of my creative ideas are easier said than done!
A great idea, lots of trial and error and one super talented colleague Efrat (from Yeladisco)who put this (bottles and tutorial) all together. Below the step by step and guide and the pretty results…

Wedding Gift tutorial – Personal Olive Oil with Clay Coins – step by step

What you’ll need:

Clay coins

Clay/ Das (1 Kg produced about 200 coins), find in any craft shop

Rolling pin

Wooden skewer

Brush

Simple vegetable oil

Round cookie cutter

Pre ordered rubber stamp with your text

Baking sheets (prevent clay from sticking to surface)

Piece of thin cotton fabric (about 30*30 cm)

Olive oil bottles

Glass bottles

Olive oil (for Jewish wedding- take note e it should be kosher)

Syringe – to help fill bottles with olive oil

Name tags

Pre -cut and hole punched papers of your choice

Pen to write name and table numbers

Natural string

Herb of your choice – rosemary will be great

getting down with it:

1. Work with small quantity of clay, a size of a grapefruit is great. Kneed your clay well.

If your clay is too dry it will be hard to knead and it will crack once you’ll try to flatten it. In this case you’ll need to moist it- wrap it up with well damp fabric cloth for few minutes. The clay will absorb the water and will be easier to work with.

2. Use your hands to flatten your clay, place the clay on your working surface (I used baking sheets on table, to prevent the clay from sticking to the table) and use rolling pin to flatten it to about half a centimeter.

3. Now, take your cookie cutter and cut your “clay cookies”. I used a cape from my laundry’s softener, it worked well for me, and its was easy to hold. Don’t worry if your not getting a perfect edge finish or shape, it should have a natural feel. if you wish to have a smooth finish edges, wet your finger and gently rub the edge.

If needed, You could dip the cap’s rims in water to help prevent the clay from sticking to it. I find it not a must do.

4. In order to stamp your clay, its best to brush some oil on the rubber stamp. You can use any kind of vegetable oil. Brush it generously but don’t exaggerate, you don’t want your coins to be too oily. I assure you that after 3-4 times you’ll get the hang of it, and know what is the right amount. If needed, gently, use paper towel or cotton to absorb excess oil from coins surface. Yet, don’t bother to much about it!

5. Pierce the coin, using a wooden skewer. Then place the disc on flat surface, pre covered with baking sheet.

Let them dry completely, it will be dry in about 1 hour. Bake them in your oven on 130 C for 30 min. let them cool off completely.

6. Use a natural string, insert clay coin together with one name card. Pull ends of string together & tie a simple knot. Then, tie a second knot with some space from the fist knot- distance rely upon proportion of your r bottle (mine was about 5 cm). Cut off the extra string from edge.

Place the ready string on the bottle neck and see if it works well for you. If needed make adjustments accordingly. Make sure you get your “master” bottle then you could follow the system from there. Touch it up with a herbal stem.

And if you got a lot of bottles to make, make sure you get a good help from somebody.

Have fun.