Looks a bit like Izannah's, doesn't it?
You will see that there is a wooden “follower” between the clamp head and the wax. There is a similar piece of wood under the mold half, too.
This helps to distribute the pressure from the clamp. I have broken the wax pieces and I actually broke a plaster mold from too much pressure, before we started using the mold followers.
Incidentally, some one suggested that Izannah’s first molds were not of iron, as is depected in her patent.
Iron would have been costly, although the Walkers and the extended family owned iron foundries.
Izannah was using completed doll heads, maybe wax or papier mache, and bald. These were coming into the country from France and mostly Germany, and would have been readily available.
Since the early dolls have so many different faces, it was suggested that the first molds may have been of plaster, and that they would frequently break. Interesting idea.
But I digress.
So you now have cotton knit adhered to a wax model, back into a duplicate mold, being pressed by a clamp.
You can use the same clamps you used with the wax. I just used these big black ones because they look like the kind Izannah was using.
Leave the whole contraption in a warm place where the “messy mix” can dry. Don’t go too warm, as the wax will melt, and maybe fall on something like a pilot light…which could be disasterous!
So the next day, assume the messy mix has dried. Release the clamps, and lighly pry the model out, with the fabric still attached. Maybe pry from the bottom, if you have to. It should come out very easily.
Any kind of moisture will cause the features to spread and deteriorate. Resist the impulse to put any water soluble material on the face.
Instead, give the face a coating of some clear plastic spray, like one of the Krylon products. It will raise the nap on the knit, but then it lays back down.
Once the piece is dry, from the acrylic spray, you can now gently pry the cloth off the short wax form.
NOW, take the full sized wax half, and put the face mask over it. Carefully.
You are going to trim the corners of the fabric
and sew the mask onto itself, across the back of the half.
You can do this by gathering, and then bringing the needle across to the other side, working back and forth.
The objective here is to smoothe out any wrinkles that might want to form at the very edge of the piece.
By going back and forth, you will find that you can force the knit to lie flat on the wax model.
Got it? Good.
Now….just on that half inch or so that was not involved with the Messy Mix on the short half, dab a little white glue. Leave not even a 1/32th of an inch right at the very edge.
The white glue can be sewn through, but it is a pain.
Let the glue dry, and you are ready for the next step. You are almost there!