Silent Princess (Legend of Zelda Inspired) Earrings

I didn't grow up with video games, so I was surprised by how far down into the Legend of Zelda fandom rabbit hole I had fallen after picking up a copy of Breath of the Wild. These earrings were inspired by the endangered silent princess flowers from that game.

Polymer Clay, in colors:

• white
• green
• yellow
• light blue

You will also need:

• blue/teal pigment (I'm using a powdered resin dye)
• bakeable adhesive for polymer clay (here I use Sculpey Bake and Bond). In this tutorial, I will refer to it as liquid clay, although it is best to not use products labeled as liquid clay as it is too thin and your flowers can move around before you get a chance to cure the clay.

Earring Findings:

• Wire Hoops (here I use "ear wires" that I got at Michael's craft store)
• Earring hooks and jump rings (or, if you find similar hoop findings as I use here, you can use stud earrings)
• Beads (optional)

Tools:

• Needle Tool
• Craft Knife
• Thin paintbrush for the pigment (I prefer to use nail art brushes)

Here we will make a base to stick the flowers to the earring wire:

1. Take a small amount of the green clay
2. Coat one side of your earring hoops with liquid clay
3. Roll out the green clay and wrap it around the wire, smoothing it out so both ends of the clay taper off to better blend with the wire findings

1. Roll out your white clay
2. Use a craft knife to cut out petal shapes. You will need 5 per flower, but it is better to have extra in case any become mishappened or tear. The extra will also be useful later on.
3. Add veining texture using a needle tool
4. Pick up a small amount of blue pigment with your paintbrush, and dust the bottom center of each petal, as pictured

1. Create a base for your flower by taking a small ball of white clay and adding a dab of liquid clay on top
2. Gently pinch together the bottom of each petal (this is optional, but you will get a slightly different look to your flowers. These photos show both how the flowers will look pinched off and not, so this is up to your own preference)
3. Use your needle tool to pick up and stick each flower petal in place onto the small ball of white clay
4. Once all the petals are in place, gently curl back the tips of each petal. It is helpful to do this over your needle tool.

The sepal is made similarly to the flower petals, but with a few alterations:

1. Roll out a sheet of green clay
2. Cut out leaf shapes, making sure they are thinner and longer than the petals you cut previously
3. Take a small ball of green clay to create a base, and add a small dab of liquid clay
4. Place each leaf shape onto the base, arranging them into a flower shape [optionally, you can flatten the edges of each leaf before placing them to minimize the harsh cut edge from the craft knife to make the leaves seem more natural]
5. Gently curl back each leaf, as you did with the flowers
6. Add liquid clay to the center of the leaves, and place the flower over top. Arrange this so each leaf peaks out from between each petal.

To create the stamens:

1. Roll out tiny balls of light blue clay (these are around <1 mm in diameter)

To create the pistil:

1. Mix a bit of white and green clay to create a light green
2. Roll out a thin snake of clay
3. Cut a stubby log, around the length of two small stamen balls (~1.5-2mm)

To make the stigma (the top part of the pistil):

1. Roll out and gently flatten a ball of yellow clay, and use the needle tool to add texture so it looks like three pill-shaped bits of clay stuck together
2. ALTERNATIVELY: roll out three tiny pill-shaped balls of yellow clay and gently shape them together [this is easier if your flowers are larger than the ones I make here]

To put it together:

1. Add liquid clay to the center of the flower
2. Stand up the light green log section of the pistil in the center
3. Add a dab of liquid clay to glue the stigma to the top part of the light green log
4. Use the needle tool to arrange the stamens (<1 mm balls) around the pistil

To create the tiny flower buds that appear attached to the blooming silent princess flowers:

1. Roll out four tiny balls of clay, and flatten three of these to create petals
2. Stick the last ball of clay to a needle tool, and shape each petal around the bud
3. Roll a sheet of green clay and cut out five leaf-shapes for the sepal of the closed bud. Each leaf should be long enough to cover the bud from base to top
4. Gently arrange each leaf shape around the bud, closing them together at the base and gently curling the tips at the opening of the bud. You can use a bit of liquid clay towards the base if you have trouble getting them to stick.

1. Roll out a thin snake of green clay to create a stem
2. Use a bit of liquid clay to stick the ends of this stem to the earring hoop. I like to place one end at the seam between wire and clay so that a flower bud will hide it.
3. Arrange your flowers and flower buds on the clay-covered wire. I like to use one flower and one bud at each end of the stem since the silent princess is usually illustrated with them together.

Tip: if your flowers and flower buds are sliding around with the liquid clay, lightly score the clay base with the needle tool to create a rougher surface for the flowers to stay put on.

Since floating silent princess petals appear in the game, they seemed like the perfect way to add additional texture to these earrings. You can also texture the green base clay or add a few leaves, but I think the petals look best!

1. If you don't have extra petals from before, make a few more petals.
2. Shape each petal so that they are not lying flat (I curl the ends of some and gently twist the ends of a few)
3. Use liquid clay to glue these petals as you see fit. To glue them to the exposed wire part, make sure the wire is coated in the back with liquid clay as well.

Bake according to the packaging instructions of your clay.

The clay I use advises baking at 266 degrees F or 130 degrees C for 15 minutes, but this can vary by the brand of clay you are using.

Beware that under-baking can cause your clay to crumble, especially here since these flowers are small and delicate. Also, be cautious of overbaking clay pieces as small as these as that can cause discoloration.

Once your earrings are done baking, you can put them together with your earring findings.

If you are using earring wires similar to these, you can either add an earring hook to the top hole with a jump ring or place the hole through a pair of stud earrings (I like the stud earring method since you can switch them between being more obviously Zelda-themed by using triforce studs, or more subtle by using an ordinary set of stud earrings).

Since the ear wires I use have a small loop at the top of the earrings, I also added a Swarovski drop crystal at the center of one (for a bit of a princessy touch) and used a headpin and amethyst bead for the other set (since the amethyst is a similar color and shape to spirit orbs).

You can also add a matte glaze if you wish over the flowers to protect the clay. Be sure the glaze is compatible with polymer clay if you do, or it can become sticky over time (do not use nail polish or mod podge, as they both tend to react and turn sticky).

And you are done! You can take these with you on your next adventure, although there is no promise they would give you any special abilities to sneak past monsters :)