Cold Porcelain - The Folk Art Tradition

by Sangeeta Shah skshah@rogers.com
(Canada)

Beautiful Floral Creations by Cold Porcelain Expert Sangeeta Shah. Contact skshah@rogers.com

I have been working with cold porcelain (cp) for 12 year now. I have a lot of experience with it as I teach it and make custom florals for wedding and parties and cakes. I not only make florals but make models too.

I give all credit to my husband for encouraging me and letting me grow to what I am now with my cold porcelain flowers. He is my motivator.

In India, cold porcelain was used to decorate earthen pots and then was colored with oil paints. With research online we find that it was a traditional folk art in other countries too.

I had done cold porcelain and bread flowers as a child with my parents. I had forgotten all about until I was re-discovered it in Sharjah (United Arab Emirates). A local Arab lady was teaching it through her store. This is when I learned her techniques of coloring the cold porcelain flowers (dipped in a water mixture with fabric dyes).

Then I indulged myself in the art of sugar crafting with a New Zealand lady making sugar flowers. I then incorporated my sugarcraft techniques with my old cp techniques in order to improve my flowers.

I bought real flowers which were available in Dubai and examined them thoroughly and would try my best to replicate them to the nearest. I would look and read through the plant encyclopedia to know the very details of the plant, flower or leaf which I could not find in the floral store. I exhibited my work at many groups in Dubai and Abu Dhabi and was interviewed by the main local newspaper media people (Itihad news papers) in 2000.

Thank you, Peter, for giving me the opportunity to tell everyone about my work. I will give some explanation of recipes in a separate article - see Cold Porcelain Recipe'.

Best regards

Sangeeta