RAISE it up! Will it soon be gone?

My story:

From the beginning of my journey with PMC and polymer clay, I have always had a need for a raised surface. 

Are you familiar with the pain that cramps up the neck and back because getting your eyes close to your work on a standard table is so difficult to do? Especially if  you are working small. I DO!

Which is why I decided there had to be something to help. Was there? Not that I could find. Sure, I had a plastic rotating surface but it only lifted the work a mere inch off the table. I even tried to find a potters wheel that would work. Neither were much help. Too big, too short, too slippery, not a smooth surface.

So I set to work looking for someone to make a rotating work surface that lifted my work up enough that I could see it well and get my hands close enough to work and NOT cause a cramp in my neck. 

This is the tool that I came up with - Linda's Turnabout. Or rather the tool maker and I. There has since been a little design change and a new tool maker who added 2 more sizes and improved on the construction of it. It's taken a little journey from where we started 15+ years ago.

But I still LOVE this tool and a lot of other artists working in a variety of media do too! Can't tell you how many different artists have purchased one and thanked us for making this tool. Some have even collected all the sizes! I believe it is one of those things that you don't know what you need until you find it. 

• Made from tool steel it is HEAVY, but stable enough to hold most anything. It rotates easily but doesn't go flying off the work bench when it is touched.
• The surface is a solid 4" square that accommodates most any size work, because the stability of the tool will support even work that is larger than the surface.
• The separate rubber mat underneath helps to secure it to keep it sitting squarely in place on most any surface.
• Best of all, it rotates! Instead of moving a piece with your hand (and potentially damaging it), you can leave the item sitting in place and work all around it just by rotating the top!

However it is NOT an anvil or jewelers block to pound on because it will damage the bearings of the turntable. Nor can a torch be used directly on the surface without a fire brick in between. It is built to take the normal wear of clay work, but that means not subjecting it to processes that would potentially damage it that are better done on surfaces meant for them.

Sculpting, painting, designing, gluing, filling molds, constructing are all activities that this baby excels at making easier!

It may disappear. My tool maker told me with his latest delivery, that he may not be able to make any more. Well, we are all getting older and thinking of retiring (not me much), but the cost of steel has gone WAY up so that what he has left could be the end of this tool for us. Same problem I've had with my other tool, Linda's Lid, most of the manufacturing companies are requiring a really large purchase of materials that small makers just can't afford to stock for years. 

You can get one here:  Linda's Turnabout