Ceramic Artists

Why Ceramicists are loving Pal Tiya Premium

Working with ceramics can be incredibly rewarding.
We love working with ceramics ... mostly.
The only two things we are not crazy about are the kiln, and how fragile finished pieces can be. The kiln restricts the size we can go to, there is the risk of our pieces exploding, and it's pretty pricey to run one!

First though…Who are we?
We're the crew from Pal Tiya International, and sculpting is what we care about. Between us, we've sculpted for decades, and used every sculpting material on the planet (no joke). We created Pal Tiya Premium, a versatile weatherproof medium for outdoor sculpture that is non-firing, and gorgeous to use.
Thousands of creative people across the globe have fallen in love with the possibilities of our medium.

Join our creative community

SIR RICHARD TAYLOR (5 times Academy Award Winner)
Co-Founder and Creative Director of Weta Workshop
"For the specific application of 'direct sculpting', with a focus on creating resilient and permanent outdoor sculptures we have not found a better product than Pal Tiya Premium"

Why use Pal Tiya Premium as well as or instead of Ceramics?

We love to put our art in the great outdoors - where accidents can happen, and bad weather definitely happens - broken projects make us sad - so we use Pal Tiya Premium (PTP).

Things ceramic artist should know about PTP:

Pieces made from PTP are not solid (just a thin shell over a suitable armature - we use foil - check out the armatures and sculpting page)
No kiln is required (PTP cures in the presence of moisture - check out the curing page)
No slip is needed (as long as PTP has a scratch coat, essentially a forked and grooved surface, it can be added to at any point in the future. You simply need to moist the surface, mix up another batch and apply. This forms a mechanical bond, meaning you can take your time with a sculpture.
Pal Tiya Premium is certainly not fragile. It cures stone hard and would require a power tool to make any changes.
PTP is a professional grade sculpting material, so when handling it you need to use gloves, and when mixing you will also need a dust mask (PTP contains portland cement so you need to handle it with these basic safety precautions.)
With PTP there is no limit to how you finish it (variety of sculpted textures, you can roll it, make impressions, paints, stains and sealants, or even mosaic)
There is absolutely no size restrictions when thinking about your next sculpture. As our medium doesn't required firing, you can build as small or as big as you like, and we have: just scroll down the page to see what's been made with Pal Tiya Premium.
The only two limits when creating in PTP are, no items for food, and no items for fish tanks (other than that; any size, shape, finish or usage is possible)

Get extremely creative, multiple textures can be achieved (stone, fur, wood, scales, rock etc)

Make impressions with open weave fabrics such as lace & burlap etc

Be cut like fabric using scissors, enabling you to make clothes for your sculptures.

This is a great product. It is good to sculpt with and easy to make large objects. I am a potter and I love that I don’t have to worry about cracking and attaching items that could break off. This is so good for students who have issues with clay. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.” Cheryl

Making armatures for your permanent scuptures using Pal Tiya Premium couldn't be easier. Pal Tiya Premium is mixed from a powder (with water) into a fabric "cookie dough" clay-like product, which goes on as a thin skin over a crushed tinfoil (cheap, malleable) armature. You can, however, use anything to bulk out your form such as cardboard, old food containers etc and cover them with crushed foil using a hot glue gun.
Because you can grow to any size with our medium, learn all you need to know when planning an armature for Pal Tiya Premium sculptures here.

Putting Pal Tiya Premium onto foil

Sculpting with Pal Tiya Premium

Goblin in Garden

Using foil as a core/armature is good because it's stiff and immediately self-supporting. It's a rich and subtle sculpting material in its own right. Foil can get the delicate complex forms of the human figure with no extra effort. It's possible to do a complete a large core/armature in a few hours.
Our product has microscopic shrinkage too, meaning you can cover glass vessels easily!

Microscopic shrinkage

6ft Dragon

Mixing

Mixing Pal Tya Premium is very satisfying! See how to mix by hand and/or machine here.

Sculpting & Tools

You'll sculpt Pal Tiya Premium with similar tools. We mainly use forks, spoons, a square and trowel, a rounded metal tool (small dental tools are great) and gloved hands. You need to wear gloves with Pal Tiya Premium as it contains portland cement so just as with air dry clay, not food safe.

When you want to join two pieces together with Pal Tiya Premium, all you have to do is make sure you have scored (forked) areas where you plan to attach. The great part is that this means when you want to make a sculpture over several days, weeks or months, as long as you have this forked surface (scratch coat) present then you can add to a piece over time. See here for more on this.

Valerie
"This clay is the best one I have used. Easy to work with. I used a wine bottle and covered it with aluminium foil. made the window sills and door sill out of foil and covered the bottle with the clay, I made the roof out of the clay as well. In the past I didn't know what to do about the roof. This clay makes my product look professional."

Snow Leopard progress showing scratch coat - 3 x 3 x 6 feet (90 x 90 x 180 cm)

Curing/strengthening

It couldn't be any easier to cure (strengthen and harden) Pal Tiya Premium!
On the day of sculpting (when you're finished) simply wrap your sculpture under plastic. Next day, come back and wrap in wet cloths or towels. After 6 days, it will be fully cured and super strong. You can leave a sculpture for a full 28 day cure and we do this for public commissions.

Coloring/painting

Pal Tiya Premium dries to a light stone grey color. This provides an excellent blank canvas so you get to full creative expression! Go Wild!
You can color with:

Exterior grade acrylic paints
Acrylic concrete stains
Oxides (mixed into the powder pre-mix)
India inks
Spray paints

Hibiscus Birdbath colored with oxides

Colored with exterior grade acrylic paint

$Picture$

Spray painted

We hope you'll consider using Pal Tiya Premium for your next idea!

"Pal Tiya (Premium) is a dream to work with. Easy to sculpt and the best part is no firing in a kiln!" - Jeanne Grip

"Pal Tiya Premium is, without a doubt, the new revolution of outdoor sculptures. The versatility of this super sculpting medium is endless.
If you are interested in creating massive, ultra-strong, fully weather proof works of art, this is product for you!" - Brandon Love, CO

How does Pal Tiya Premium work?
You mix the powder with water to create a cookie-dough-clay-like mixture and apply it to your tinfoil armatures.

Do I need to bake or fire it?
Nope, Pal Tiya Premium cures under plastic with moisture!

Where can I learn more?
Get started here